Geoff swaps boots for bridles

Victorian octogenarian harness racing trainer Geoff Senior loved playing Aussie rules football that he thought he’d ever give it away.

“I wasn’t much good at it, but I just thoroughly enjoyed it. I played about 200 games for Surrey Hills mostly in a back pocket, with one premiership which was nice,” Senior said.

“When we had football training, we’d see a guy named Bill Wright working his horses around the outside of the oval. Bill was the local wood man, and he would drive his horses around the roads from Box Hill to Footscray just to trial them,” he said.

“I ended up becoming quite interested and leased a horse off him called Scotch Fleet. I’d had a bit to do with horses because they were used back then by bakers and in the milk carts.”

Senior finished third at his first harness racing drive at the old Ararat track.

“I’d got involved in the sport in the mid-1960s and took a few years to land my first winner in 1970. But we’ve had a lot of fun over the years and visited a lot of places with the horses,” he said.

“I’m 83 now and I gave up driving about six years ago. I drove in every state with the exception of Western Australia and one of the highlights was competing in the 1979 Trotters Interdominion at Addington in New Zealand.

“We broke in the qualifying heat and ended up running fifth in the consolation. They had fields of 17 or 18 in those days and I remember the eventual winner No Response just zipped through the field like a rocket.”

The Senior stable has produced many winners over the years and Geoff admits he enjoys training square gaiters most.

“I’ve been lucky to have had a lot of good trotters over the years,” he said.

“An old favorite was Hecs Hope who went from a maiden to winning five in Melbourne in the space of 18 months.

“One night at the old Showgrounds track, he won after starting 72 yards behind.”

The Seniors began a tradition of heading north to Queensland to avoid the Victorian winter with a horse they raced in the South Australian Oaks in the early 2000s.

“She was called Spring Deed and ended up winning about 15 races. We did no good in the Oaks but the following year we decided to go to Queensland with her because we’d never been there,” he said.

The annual migration north continued for 19 years, with many tales to tell.

“I ended up buying a block of eights units on the beach near the famous Kirra Hotel. The pub recently saw ‘last drinks’, because it’s earmarked for demolition,” he said.

“The late (legendary NSW trainer) Tony Turnbull would rent some of the units for months when they used to take big teams up to Tweed Heads. I enjoyed being up there racing at The Tweed (Tweed Heads), the Gold Coast, Rocklea on Saturday afternoons, Redcliffe and Toowoomba.

“After we raced at Tweed most of us would head back to the pub. There were some characters up there, but they were good trainers.

“One of my great mates in Bill Rose, who played football for Collingwood, used to come up with us. One year Bill landed a double at Albion Park with Beryls Prince and Vendors Boy —they started at 25/1 and 33/1 and he was presented with a coffee table for the longest-priced double.

“I don’t think Bill had ever won a metro race prior that and we ended up selling those two horses to America.”

Senior and his wife Lauris operated a paper bag business for 20 years, were later moteliers at Yea and ran an office supplies business in Warrnambool.

The couple, who have six children, 20 grandchildren and 24 great grandchildren moved to Koroit about 17 years ago to be near family.

“We have two girls and four boys. Three of the boys in Ian, John and Wayne all drove. Robert was the only one who didn’t. Wayne actually drove consecutive city winners—he won one week and went back and did it again the following week.

“John still buys a few and is into breeding as well. He’s got some nice ones.

“We’re now only training two because we’ve tipped a couple of others out for a spell. (Square gaiter Icicle is a winner of 10 races and lines up at Melton this Saturday night, while pacer Oakalero Lad has posted 14 victories.)

“This area’s magic to train horses because we can vary their routine so easily. I have a jog track in a paddock near home, but we can take them down to the beach for a swim or a workout, and we also have a girl who comes and rides the horses which is good for them.

“Each morning I look forward to getting up and doing the horses. I’ll keep doing it for as long as I can. You know it’s hard to kill a weed in the garden!”

by Terry Gange for Harnesslink