With Macau back in the news these days with different parties, including a company that’s part of the powerful Genting Group from Malaysia competing for new casino licenses, and some saying that there are plans to turn the peninsula into the Monte Carlo of Asia, we thought it might be interesting to revisit some of the racing stories in Macau, especially during those early, middle and “wayward” days of The Macau Jockey Club.
Everything that went on during those times made “The Hangover” look like a tea party hosted by Ken and Barbie....
-------------------------------
It might be hard for some to believe, but racing in Macau once had legs- of course nothing like Hong Kong racing- but still legs, perhaps on the skinny side, but good enough to make the trek over on a weekend, and even on a Tuesday evening for the night races.
(Source: Wiki)
Again, it’s something hard to believe when one sees the Noddy, Big Ears and Camptown Doo Da racing that goes on there today, like last weekend’s Macau leg of the stunted Hong Kong-Macau interport, where horses plodded through Cowabunga quicksand.
(Source: HKJC)
No, when the MJC started, and despite some very dodgy executive hires, one accepted the good with the bad and welcomed jockeys relatively new to this part of the world like Colin Dean, definitely the best jockey who was riding there in those early days, but who just disappeared down Alice’s hole, and was lucky to later leave India in one piece.
(Source: NT News)
Riding alongside him were Simon Jones, Neil Paine, Claude Piccione, Mark Gallagher, Steve Burridge, Jose Corrales, former Hong Kong-based jockeys Geoff Allendorf, Tony Ives, Declan Murphy, Rob Heffernan and Danny Brereton, plus the gorgeous Swedish female jockey Jenny Moeller who ended up marrying Bobby Vance and are now the parents of the talented rider Maija Vance.
(Source: Punters Paradise)
There were trainers like Singaporean Charles Leck for whom Colin Dean rode, the weird training Double Burger combo comprising Natalis Chan, actor and one-time singer with the band called The Loosers (sic) who got rid of him and achieved success as the Wynners, and Joe Murphy, former trots driver Joe Barnes, Gordon “The Bear” Benson, former amateur jockey George Williams, one-time champion Irish jockey and full-time leprechaun Johnny Roe, below, John Gilmore and others whom I can’t recall.
(Source: Daily Mail)
These were the days before the arrival of the Moores- George and Gary Moore- quite a coup for the MJC and which was greeted like the Second Coming of the Messiah.
Following them were a number of jockeys whose time and gigs were up in Hongkers.
There was also John Didham, personally speaking, the most financially successful jockey to ride in Macau, Rob Heffernan, Brent Thomson, Sam Hyland, Danny Beasley, Steven Arnold, Michael Cahill, the very gifted Christian Reith, along with trainers who were given a second lease of racing life with a license to train in Macau.
This generation of racing personalities in what was still a Portuguese enclave might have helped tart up the joint, especially having the the mighty Moores there, but it soon also ushered in- VERY LOUDLY- the term “orders from upstairs” and when the odds on a horse at, let’s say, 8 to 1, would change to 2s – 400 metres from home.
This totalisator “malfunction” occurred when bookies were alleged to have received their “orders from upstairs.” Jockeys who had problems following orders had their licenses taken away and banished forever.
(Source: ISSU)
When, however, the Macau Jockey Club opened its doors and track, it allowed in a rabble of characters who became owners. Others, sensing an easy buck, became friends with owners and supposedly “representing” various jockeys- and their “tips for sale”.
The ubiquitous Cosmo Chan must have been in that mish-mash of sycophants. And good grief, Macau racing attracted sycophants with a deft understanding of the saying, There’s a sucker born every minute.
(Source: Bit Strips)
The racing was okay despite two of the worst race callers heard anywhere- an Indian bloke and his sidekick Franco Lau who made today’s MJC race-caller Harry Troy sound like Richard Burton.
What made that trek over on ferry and sitting next to chicken farmers gagging on phlegm was hooking up with mates before the races at the Hyatt Regency for a dinner of cod fish balls, African Chicken, Portuguese fried rice and plenty of sangria while making plans to go out.
(Source: V Tourist)
(Source: Food Marks)
There was not much planning per se as it was either hitting the cattle market called Darling and seeing if you got lucky by picking an attractive girl parading her wares with a number pinned on her, or going “upmarket” and seeing what new Eastern European
ladies were available at Club De China or going downtown and checking out the freelance menagerie trawling through the arcades of Hotel Lisboa.
(Source: Photo Bucket)
The night almost always ended one way: Meeting up at the club at the Mandarin Hotel where jockeys, trainers, owners, off-work ladies and bug-eyed black performers did their fifth-rate Vegas funk schtick and which was lapped up by those too drunk to know or care.
(Source: Macau Resorts)
Often, especially for those from Hong Kong, these night outs happened the night before race day and many would struggle to get to the races by 1pm the next day.
It was The Hangover- and it was a far more surreal plot with a far weirder cast of characters.
(Source: ISSH)
There was also a dark side to Macau- trainers forced to carry guns for protection, and the tragic case of lawyer Gary Alderdice who left for Moscow with US$50,000 to try and buy out his Russian girlfriend from the clutches of gangsters for whom she worked. Both were found bound, gagged and shot dead.
At the races, the more brave- and stupid- would bring their conquests from the night before to the track, something that would send shock waves through the main restaurant and looks of horror from the wives of trainers and jockeys.
(Source: Best Horror Movies)
Memories of a jockey currently riding very successfully in Queensland inviting his Russian trophy girlfriend to the races- she was dressed in a gold mini dress and white go-go boots- while his pregnant wife was back home, created more squawking by the other wives than a scene from Hitchcock’s “The Birds”. Not smart.
(Source: SOD Ahead)
At this time, the two most colorful owners from Hong Kong were The Man In Black- Tony Morias- and suave music executive Norman Cheng, below, two very different personalities.
(Source: CRI)
Cheng, who still races horses in Macau and has had horses with George Moore, Jose Corrales, MC Tam, Peter Leyshan and, currently, Gary Moore, was urbane and played his cards close to his chest.
(Source: Funny Fidos)
Morias, far louder, had more gold around his neck than Mr T, plonked himself at his special lucky table and surrounded himself with tip sheets from every trainer along with a posse of random runners who would provide him with “last minute information” and “mafoo tips” for money and worked 3-4 mobile telephones at the same time.
Finding out if he won a race would take twenty minutes with more new information from his sycophants coming in all the time.
(Source: Cartoon Stock)
Whenever his horse- Call The Police would run- a regular ride for Philip Waldren- the series of sequences resembled a Marx Brothers movie on steroids and with Tony Morias usually ending up being Groucho. Call The Police was not a horse worth betting on.
(Source: Fan Pop)
Was he ever up at the end of a season? This is debatable as he was constantly on Information Overload. He also wasn’t exactly a chill pill.
(Source: Copy 2 Contact)
As for Norman Cheng, he came close to tasting glory twice- once when the best horse he owned- Rock’n Roll- was the red hot favorite to win the first Macau Derby.
After months of meeting jockeys, checking and cross-checking and possibly even cross-dressing, it was simply a question of which horse would come second.
(Source: Images BN)
Alas, we all know what they say about the best-laid plans. This was when standing in the paddock area and seeing the regular jockey of the horse, and extremely confident that the horse would win, looking so uncomfortable he had developed a nervous tic.
(Source: Punters Paradise)
For whatever reason, Rock’n Roll came a plodding fourth, whereas a 35 to 1 bolter won the race and the connections of the losing favourite licked their wounds and took that ferry ride from hell along with the chicken farmers.
(Source: One Step 4ward)
These days, going racing in Macau can only be taken in small doses- even smaller than what the turnover is though there are those who still enjoy the weekly experience.
(Source: Racing Write)
Membership has shriveled like George Castanza attack of shrinkage after a cold swim whereas the same handful of owners keep buying very average horses.
(Source: Mikew Chan)
The jockeys-merry-go-round continues which has seen abrupt departures by jockeys Brent Stanley, below, Manuel Nunes and others. There had also been short riding stints by Robyn Freeman, Bernadette Cooper, Lisa Cropp and others who came and went.
(Source: Zimbio)
The marriage-merry-go-round in Macau made Desperate Housewives look tame, trainers Gary Moore and MC Tam ruled the roost with jockeys Luis Corrales, Stanley Chin and “Fred” Durso, below, having survived the wrath of those “orders from upstairs.”
(Source: MJC)
As Dr Hunter S Thompson might have written, What a weird and strange trip it’s been.
One has to wonder what the powerful Angela Ho has in mind to perhaps make what is a good racecourse with all the necessary hardware and facilities, a club that can either compete with or become a partner of casino-mad Macau. Or maybe there’s a bigger picture taking shape...
(Source: MJC)
