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By Ray Hickson

For the most part, trackwork riders go about their business behind the scenes working horses up to trial and race fitness before handing over the reins to the race day jockey.

In the past couple of months, with a spring carnival approaching and amid Covid-19 restrictions, Sydney’s trackwork riders have been called on to step up and ride in important barrier trials at Rosehill and Warwick Farm, including some of our potential spring stars.

Racing NSW spoke to Michelle Read, a mainstay in the Joe Pride team, and Stuart Rankin from the David Payne stable to find out their stories and how they’ve handled the extra exposure.

Both are former jockeys and have been long term employees, Read has partnered most of Pride’s stable stars including TAB Everest hopeful Eduardo while Rankin is dual Group 1 winner Montefilia’s regular rider, and though they’re somewhat reluctant heroes they’re more than happy to go the extra mile at a difficult time.

Michelle Read on the Joe Pride-trained Diva Da Vinci.

“We all have to help each other out especially with what’s going on,’’ Rankin said.

“It’s not about the attention, I’m there to do my job for David to the best of my ability. I’m not looking for any brownie points, just to work with the horses.”

Read, 39, started out as a jockey on the Mid North Coast as a 15-year-old, she was apprenticed to Ross Stitt and made the move five years later to Sydney to take a trackwork rider role at Crown Lodge and while she considered going back to the country she soon found a dream job with Pride.

A normal day for Read is a 4am start, she’ll ride around seven horses and finish up around 8.30am. At the moment she’s doing home schooling and also works in the Pride Racing office.

“We’re just doing what we enjoy, it’s not something you’d do if you didn’t,’’ she said.

“I just like riding horses, I like the way Joe trains, and I’ve ridden most of Joe’s good ones.”

That list includes Pride’s first ever Group 1 winner Red Oog, Regal Cheer, the old warhorse Destiny’s Kiss, Tiger Tees and Fasika.

Obviously Eduardo is the star of the moment and Read said, as he prepares to trial at Warwick Farm on Tuesday, he’s a reflection of Pride’s style as he’s blossomed in the 12 months or so he’s been in the stable.

“He’s a beautiful horse and he feels like a good horse. He was a little fiery when he first came but he’s relaxed now and he’s lovely,’’ she said.

“At the moment I like Ballistic Lover, she’s pretty quirky. She’s got a lot of personality.”

Read will step aside for Tuesday’s trial with Robbie Dolan, currently based at the Farm, taking the ride on Eduardo but she’ll partner Diva Da Vinci for Pride at the trial session.

Stuart Rankin has links with David Payne, who of course was a champion jockey and trainer in South Africa before he moved to Australia, that date back to when his father Stanley used to ride against Payne.

So it’s a bit of a coincidence that when he came to Sydney for a holiday more than a decade ago and handed out CVs looking to make the move that he wound up in the Payne stable.

“I was looking to spread my wings somewhere else and get out of South Africa, I came over here for a two-week holiday and handed my CV out and David decided to sponsor me,’’ Rankin said.

Stuart Rankin and David Payne's star mare Montefilia at Rosehill.

“It wasn’t easy, it took almost a year to get into the country with all the red tape but he was willing to sponsor me and we got the ball rolling there.”

Rankin, 44, was “born into the game” in Zimbabwe and his family, most involved in racing, moved to South Africa in the early 1980s where he started his apprenticeship.

He’d worked with some of South Africa’s leading trainers before making the move to Sydney.

When he started with Payne he was in a foreman role, he left for a short time but returned about 12 months ago and he’s been primarily a trackwork rider. He partnered both Montefilia and Gleneagles in their trials at Rosehill last Friday.

“Ever since stepping back into the yard I’ve been riding Montefilia,’’ he said.

“She’s definitely come on, she’s a four-year-old now and it’s going to get tougher but I thought her trial was very good.

“That was the first time she’s led, not that I was intending to lead but she was doing it so happily I thought I’d just let her roll on.”

Michelle Read and Stuart Rankin are just two of many talented trackwork riders, strappers and other often unseen workers who have gone out of their way to ensure racing continues as smoothly as possible. And that shouldn’t be undersold.

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