This has been a season to savour for Croft, one of Hawkesbury’s longest-serving trainers.
It's 19 years since Paul Perry set the racing world alight by achieving the “impossible” – winning Royal Ascot’s famous sprint double with a horse from the other side of the world!
Gundagai born, Smart has long had an association with horses, enjoying camp drafting and riding bulls at rodeos in his younger days.
Now in his 36th year as a trainer, the 64-year-old is also looking after Newcastle Jockey Club’s equine pool on the Broadmeadow racecourse site.
A beef cattle farmer first and a hobby trainer second until a few years ago, Mulholland swapped roles through necessity – and it has paid off handsomely.
He was 20 when he moved to the Hawkesbury district to work for Ron Barr at Osborne Stud (now Godolphin’s Osborne Park), then worked for Barry Cameron at Castlereagh, breaking in a lot of yearlings for the Ingham brothers (and later also broke in plenty for Gai Waterhouse).
Coyle also worked for fellow Randwick trainers John O’Shea and David Payne, who set up shop there after arriving from South Africa in 2002 before later shifting camp to Rosehill Gardens.
Racing has long been in Colvin’s blood. His father Fred was an amateur jockey, and his uncles Noel and John rode professionally.
From Cootamundra wattle country and, of course, the birthplace of legendary cricketer Sir Donald Bradman, Bateup was a racing fanatic early on.