Noel Callow

By Andrew Eddy

At the centre of attention was a jockey in the red and lilac colours madly waving his arms, punching the sky, poking his tongue out and then star-jumping off the horse on returning to the mounting yard. He was Noel Callow, as brash and instinctive as always.

I first met Callow in 1989. A son of successful rider Kevin Callow from Adelaide, he was apprenticed to Eddie Laing at Epsom and one of his first assignments in his new and exciting role in Melbourne was to look after a filly I part-owned called Marine Beach.

My first impression of the then 15-year-old was that he was a rare individual. Within moments of being introduced, he was telling Laing, a veteran and successful horseman, exactly how to train horses.

He then turned on us and suggested how we should write our racing stories and then turned his attention to the bloke with the broom. He soon told him how to sweep.

Despite this slightly annoying over-confidence, he was somehow a likeable kid. Not that it mattered too much as kids like him do not last.

Masters expect their apprentices to be respectful, to listen and learn, to obey instructions and to stay out of trouble. Callow failed in all these categories.

A few months later, Laing sent him packing and over the next few years, Callow found himself in a variety of different stables. Added to his woes was that, as he matured, his weight began to soar. Stories continued to abound about how he had yet another punch-up with a fellow rider in the jockey's room. He was a hot-head who was never going to make it.

Sure enough, Callow gave up riding in the mid-1990s and, among other pursuits, began working in a bottle shop. Like so many before him, he had drifted out of the game. Few, if any, thought he would mature and could return to race riding, let alone become Australia's leading rider by winners, as is the case this season. But he did make it back. The ability was always there but, suddenly, so was the application and the dedication.