Noel Callow by Andrew Eddy

Noel Callow
by Andrew Eddy


The day Callow turned potential to Guineas riches
December 6, 2003

After a shaky start to his career, jockey Noel Callow has proved himself a stayer, writes Andrew Eddy.

It was the afternoon of October 11, 2003, and the scene was a normal one of controlled mayhem. It was in the mounting yard at Caulfield just moments after the 123rd running of the classic, the Caulfield Guineas.

But while owners, trainers and journalists were pushing, shoving and leaning in on post-race conversations, a few of the hacks stood back. Those with long memories shook their heads and shared a laugh.

There had probably been greater winners of the Caulfield Guineas than In Top Swing and there had been more memorable contests, but, for some of us, this truly was a moment that 10 years or so earlier would have been unimaginable.

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.

Callow, now 28, and his manager Des O'Keeffe, whom he teamed up with this year, worked some magic a few weeks before the Caulfield Guineas just to earn Callow the ride on the New South Wales-trained gelding In Top Swing.

O'Keeffe, who was certain an in-form Callow would suit the horse, sent Hawkesbury trainer Noel Mayfield-Smith Callow's curriculum vitae via fax and when the trainer noted that the rider's group 1 record was not attached, O'Keeffe said he thought that the last page of the fax must have been lost.

It had not. It was just that Callow had not ridden a group 1 winner before and this would count against him as the Hawkesbury trainer decided on who would ride his three-year-old in the Caulfield Guineas.

But Mayfield-Smith knew Callow was hungry. His record showed that he had ridden an amazing 30 winners in September. He was clearly riding as well as any other jockey in the land, and so Mayfield-Smith booked him.

The horse to beat in the $1 million classic was the certain leader Exceed And Excel, but there were other dangers, with Ambulance and Elvstroem likely to be running on late in the race. Callow would have to keep one eye on the speed and another on the backmarkers.

In Top Swing drew barrier four and Callow found a lovely spot on the rails after the field had jumped away. Exceed And Excel had broken the field up with his speed, but Callow kept him in his sights in the knowledge the favourite had had a virus during the week and could be vulnerable.

Once the field had turned for home, Callow set out after Exceed And Excel but In Top Swing had sprinted quickly and the favourite began to wobble. Suddenly, Callow found himself in front with more than half the straight to negotiate.

He remembered the backmarkers and so it was not time to be pretty or to show off. His head went down and his tail up and Callow barely drew breath as he worked on keeping his horse balanced and his action correct.

Metres from the line, Callow knew he was the winner as Face Value could not reel him in and the others were not coming home quickly enough.

Callow rose to meet the line. Standing high in the irons with his whip hand pointed skywards and his tongue flapping in the wind, Callow had won a group 1, and not just any. It was a Caulfield Guineas.

But Callow was not finished just yet. He saluted the crowd all the way back to the mounting yard, where he performed a credible, if not totally graceful, star-jump. He then entertained the crowd with his colourful post-race speech and hammed it up with the media.

The former loud-mouth kid with a short fuse and an opinion on everything had made it. Now, there might be no stopping him.