Scott Richardson Celebrates First Group 1

[MediaPA 15]

Twenty four hours after securing his first Group One win as a thoroughbred owner retired stockbroker Scott Richardson, pictured, was taking time out in his usual quiet and understated manner to celebrate a victory that has been a lifetime in the making.

 

Richardson’s gallant six-year-old mare Diademe provided that breakthrough victory at the highest level when she refused to yield in the closing stages of Saturday’s Fiber Fresh New Zealand Thoroughbred Breeders’ Stakes at Te Aroha and ignited a smile that Richardson has found hard to shake since.

 

“It’s a tough game this racing game and I’ve had plenty of slow ones over the years so when you are lucky enough to get a win like this you have to savour it,” he mused from his Mount Maunganui home where he retired just over three years ago after spending his working life in Auckland.

 

“It took me a number of years to figure out this racing game and I’m probably still learning now but you soon work out there are plenty of tough times along the way so when you get a moment like this you have to take the time to celebrate because you never know just what’s around the corner.”

 

Richardson’s passion for thoroughbred racing was fired at an early age when growing up on the outskirts of Matamata.

 

“A friend and I used to hang around together a fair bit and we used to see this guy working with a grey horse on the property next door,” he recalled.

 

“We were about 10 at the time and we decided one day we would go over and see what he was doing.

 

“It turned out it was Norm Crawford who was a top notch trainer and the grey was one of the horses in his stable. The horse was called Our Chance and never won a race but that was the day I got bitten by the bug right then and there.”

 

Like most New Zealand boys growing up Richardson was an avid sports enthusiast and spent much of his free time reading about racing and sports.

“None of my family was in to racing at all but I used to read whatever I could about it and just got hooked,” he said.

 

“I was at boarding school in Auckland and when I left there I ended up getting my first job for stock-broking firm Jordan Sandman Smythe where a principal of the firm became a member of the Auckland Racing Club Committee so that also fired my interest.”

 

As his career progressed Richardson went from being an avid form student and casual punter to a prospective owner and took the plunge in 1982 when he and a friend purchased a two-year-old from a “ready to run” sale at Ellerslie.

“I had become a member at Ellerslie and a mate and I went to a sale there that was for two-year-olds that had already raced,” he said.

This post has been promoted to an article