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Brisbane, 1984. It all started with a simple plan to secretly swap a mediocre horse with a faster one, and rake in the cash with a few well-placed bets. What could possibly go wrong? In The Fine Cotton Fiasco, Peter Hoysted and Pat Sheil brilliantly tell the scarcely believable tale of how – through a combination of horrendous mismanagement, terrible judgement and comically bad luck – the scheme gradually unravelled. How did a horse with white painted socks dripping onto the turf come to hold the hopes of punters across Australia and beyond? How was a supposedly secret plan so widely advertised that even the Queensland Commissioner of Police placed a bet? And how much of a cover-up ensued in the aftermath of this absolute debacle? The story of Fine Cotton is the stuff of Australian legend. It features hardcore crims, likeable rogues and a supporting cast that ranged from the hapless to the hopeless – with some entirely innocent bystanders thrown in for good measure. Not every crazy scheme cooked up by a couple of inmates in Boggo Road Gaol would culminate in a story that will be told across the nation for the next hundred years. But this one did.
Chronicles Peter Christian Barrie's efforts to fool horse racing authorities by painting horses with henna dye to disguise good race horses as bad ones, fooling betters and fixing races.
A champion racehorse, Bold Ruler thrilled fans with his speed and courage. But as a sire of runners, Bold Ruler truly reigned. He was America's leading sire a record eight years, with his best offspring being the immortal Secretariat.
In Legends of the Track: Australia's champion jockeys and trainers, best-selling author Alan Whiticker tells the stories of 25 modern-era horse racing greats.This book celebrates the careers of champions trainers such as Bart Cummings, Tommy Smith, Colin Hayes, Gai Waterhouse, Lee Freedman and Chris Waller, and features interviews with the best jockeys of the modern era - Ron Quinton, Darren Beadman, Shane Dye, Hugh Bowman, Damien Oliver, Glen Boss and James McDonald.With full career statistics for each chapter and dozens of rare photos, Legends of the Track details the greatest achievements in a wonderful sporting era of Australian horse racing.
""Reading 'Track Tales' is like key-holing a personal diary that gives the human drum on the racing industry in Australia during the early 1980s. The poems perversely honour the men, women, horses and dogs that were the industry at the time ... the poems jostle at the starting gate. Suddenly they're off and running A totally absorbing read."" Martin Christmas, author of 'Immediate Reflections'
From racing to football to lawn bowls, no sport has been left untouched. Great Australian Sports Rorts reveals that nefarious conduct has affected just about every sport in this country. And every mechanism known – be it physical, mechanical or chemical – has been employed. When a sporting contest is taking place, and there is either a reward for the winner or there is betting on the contest, it is almost guaranteed that one person will attempt to relieve another person of what is rightfully theirs. And if a degree of skulduggery is required to attain the right result or to assist in the transfer of funds from one person’s pocket to another, then so be it. Cheating: it’s as Australian as Sunday barbecues.Join John ‘Dr Turf’ Rothfield and John Adams on a rollicking ride through the sporting outrages that have rocked Australia.
An overview of the evolution of Australian sport during the 20th Century, Higher Richer Sleazier is a lament for the innocence and good sportsmanship of a former time. In today's Winning-Is-Everything world what has sport - and we as viewers and society as a whole - lost as a result? In the Australian Dreamtime, sports stars were inspired amateurs, filled to overflowing with the glorious Olympic dreams of Baron de Coubertin. Guys who had begun by banging a golf ball with a stump against a water tank and just got better and better at it; golden girls who ran and swam gloriously before settling down as wives and mothers. What would happen today if a modern athlete, sponsored to the hilt and la...
Best of Talkin' Horses features provocative chats with Thoroughbred racing's most prominent names. Adapted from the popular weekly online series of the same name hosted by Bloodhorse.com, this edited collection will provide additional insights by Ron Mitchell.
A RICHARD AND JUDY BOOK CLUB PICK 'Such an addictive and likeable book...One of this year's best memoirs' The Telegraph 'Rough Magic is transporting, beguiling and terrifically entertaining' Daily Mail The Mongol Derby is the world's toughest horse race. A feat of endurance across the vast Mongolian plains once traversed by the people of Genghis Khan, competitors ride 25 horses across a distance of 1000km. Many riders don't make it to the finish line. In 2013, Lara Prior-Palmer - nineteen, underprepared but seeking the great unknown - decided to enter the race. Driven by her own restlessness, stubbornness, and a lifelong love of horses, she raced for seven days through extreme heat and terri...
The most comprehensive reference book on betting on horse (and greyhound) betting on the market with over 500 cross referenced entries. It explores the history, systems, theory, law and slang associated with betting on racing as well as the scandals, scams, ringers and the huge array of unforgettable characters and audacious coups.