OLD-timers will tell you about the many great jockeys who have ridden at Cluden.
High on that list is Paul Gordy, a born and bred local, who from
humble beginnings became a legend.
He won every major race in the district – yet still admits quite
philosophically that he “underachieved”.
The enigmatic master of the saddle, often known as grumpy,
waged a fierce battle with weight in his post-apprentice days, when the minimum riding weight was 7 stone (45kg). Today it is 54kg.
The ravages of wasting and onset of painful arthritis that wreaked his battered body finally took their toll in 2000.
The day he climbed on a horse named Scatman, he returned the scales, dismounted and said simply to those around him: “That’s it – I’m finished”, and he never rode another horse.
It was a winning and above all fitting farewell for a jockey who achieved so many goals.
To this day he still doesn’t know how many winners he rode in a 34-year career.
“Because I didn’t count them.”
Naturally he lists Gay James as the best he ever rode. He won the 15 races Gay James scored in succession – even more consecutive wins than Carbine, Phar Lap and Brigadier Gerard – and today talks of the “devastation” he suffered when his
favourite horse died underneath him of a heart attack during track work.
“I never got over it.”
Other highlights were winning the 1990 Lightning and Cleveland Bay on Major Tranche, and in the same year winning the Townsville and Cairns cups on Gift Man.
Another was being named finalist in the 1991 Townsville Sportsman of the Year – in an era when the title carried much prestige.
Paul Gordy was aboard Taubada, which gave Brian Mayfield Smith his first metropolitan winner, when he scored at Eagle Farm in the 1970s.
It was a pick-up ride, as the late Bill Bethel became indisposed after he cut his foot mowing the lawn (wasting) the previous day.
Gordy obviously impressed the city trainers, as he was offered
contracts to stay south – but increasing weight and a young family growing up in Wulguru forced him home.
It is a regret he sometimes still harbours, for he says he “could have made it” – and many agree.
The Gordy family (and his prized possession – an ocean-going boat) moved to Forest Beach, just outside Ingham, 10 years ago so he could enjoy his other passion – fishing.
When not home barracking for the Broncos or having a fling at the TAB, he is out ravaging the rivers or the reef – and not all eskies on board are full of bait!
He keeps himself busy during the week by driving a bitumen truck for Hinchinbrook Council.
He says he was attracted to racing by his love for horses and the challenge. And he recommends the profession to any young budding rider because “there are many more opportunities these
days and the higher scale of weights makes it so much easier”.
He keeps in touch with the racing game with financial interests in two young horses currently in work with his old Wulguru mate and colleague Kelly Schweida in Brisbane – a Manhattan Rain colt named Lacarda Point and a Foxwedge filly purchased
at the last MM sales for $150,000.
Does he miss it?
“Yes, of course. I miss the companionship and the challenge – but certainly not the wasting.”