This Racing Life, 2012: John Messara

it's appropriate today that we find ourselves at the Sydney city-based offices of John Messara Zahra field stud you see John describes himself as the Pitt Street farmer made good but life wasn't always good he arrived on these shores as a young boy leaving behind his parents in Egypt on Anthony Mithun and this is John Messara 'he's racing life [Applause] [Music] first of all what's life look like being Australia's most influential breeder well your influence is only as good as your last group one winner so that's a passing phase whether you are influential a lot but look I'm a I'm a keen breeder and I've turned what was perhaps a hobby and a passion into a business and I look forward to going to work every day as a result so why life is good John we know you emigrated to Australia at a very early age what did life look like for a young John Messara well I came to Australia as a french-speaking young boy with who had been to an English school in North Africa in Egypt and I quickly got more proficient at English it was I went to the British boys school as a young man it took a while to get used to what is an entirely different culture here in Australia there was the school I went to had a lot of emphasis on sport and lucky for me I had a bit of size and speed about me which helped me go on get on with school and of course like most original migrants you get more passionate about your country than than those that are born here but I came here a very long time ago I was sent here at the age of eleven to do my secondary education because a lot of the Messara family had already come to Australia themselves and it set up businesses here and so I was sent by my parents to live with an uncle Bernard for the first three years from 11 to 50 or 14 my parents followed after that in retrospect that was a very good decision that my parents made and at the time I didn't question it they said you were going to go to Australia you know in six or twelve months time whatever it was and I it was my father's in the future I didn't think much about it I wasn't even sure whether they're going or not you know you're a kid you you're distracted by things but when the day came and they took me to the airport I must say it was a shock and they had to sort of drag me away I was hanging on to my mother's skirt and they had to pull me up put me on the plane and I remember the plane actually got to Darwin and a seagull got into the the engine and we had to wait overnight or maybe even two days for for a new engine to come in and I was put in a motel and I was petrified that they'd leave without me and I'd be stuck in Darwin so these but I have to say that these sort of experiences made me a lot more independent that I that I had been and I was a you know the mummy's boy at that stage a lot more independent and they were part of an important part of my growing up but consider myself very lucky that that's the place I came to and that's my home that's been terribly difficult to leave the country of your birth and leave your parents behind to come to a land that you knew very little about yeah there were difficult times I cried it quite a bit in those at that time I remember particularly the very early days I used to write to my parents every Sunday night and my uncle would take the letter to the office and Monday and post it and that was part of the deal but when I left to come my mother got very sick because she had two children myself and my sister and it was really tearing partner Paneth part of her away to send me off so far I did go back once for a month at Christmas after 18 months so in the space of three years I only saw my parents for one month my uncle and aunt they were lovely people and they took me in as their own son and they had a single daughter and they couldn't have another child so they were delighted to have me there because it meant I could play with their daughter and be like a brother to their daughter so it worked out very well from that point of view and your parents life in Australia yeah they came and a few years later and they loved it here and they settled here but they came to see me and see where they would settle and they decided that I was so well settled and you know it was a great country and they stayed so in the end there were four Messara boys of my father's generation here all doing quite well in their own businesses so how do you adapt how does a young bloke who has come from another country that barely knows the language assimilate into the Australian Way of life I wasn't very academic at school and I spent all my time thinking about athletics and and and and rugby and it's only when I got to university that my father said to me I think I don't think you'll be able to get through on your marks and I said no I think I'll be able to get through and I said but you're to make it worth my while what if I get a Commonwealth scholarship at the end of the first year at the University will you buy me a car he realized my first mistake I didn't describe the car I should have said no to buy me XYZ my just said a car and I fell into a big trap and then he said I'll tell you what if you win a scholarship for the following two years then the money I saved from that sending you then those days you paid to go to university he said I'll buy you a car well I I decided then from the age of 17 to start studying pretty hard and I did and I got a couple a scholarship and so I got me okay he got me a $300 car I got badly burned that was the first business lesson in life and it was a little car called the Cobra which was a standard 10 engine enveloped in a virtually a plastic car even a fiberglass car it was but it's all I needed those days to go to the beach and play around with my friends so that was it so I really threw myself into university in a big way and I gave like everything up at that time and I got through the Commerce degree specializing in a can't see in finance there they were my my things and and that took me to the age of 20 21 and then I launched myself into business by taking a job with our accounting firm and then ultimately getting into stock broking and ultimately having my own firm and stock broking where did the interest in racing come because most people I know in the racing game have been bitten by the bug at an early age what was what was your moment where you got the ball on the backside well my father and his brother and one of his brothers who stayed back from 1961 raced horses themselves and they used to take me to the races as a ten-year-old occasionally and so and when they came to Australia they bought one or two horses and raced them here so I'd been involved on the racing side but it wasn't until 1979 that I got involved in a bigger way particularly in breeding the only animal I knew a bit about was horses so I decided that yes I'd start off by buying a broodmare and perhaps racing it for a bit longer and then going to start with etc and that's how it all started with one horse [Applause] [Music] so it seems a fascinating sort of journey how does a Pitt Street stockbroker turn themselves into one of the most influential breeders this country has ever seen when I was elected I was the youngest member ever of the Sydney Stock Exchange in those days so I think I was 26 but before that I was lucky enough to have a boss that decided that because I had I could speak French that I might be a good young fella to send off to open the European office in Geneva so I did have a stint of a couple of years in Geneva when I was about 24 23 24 which is very young what an experience yeah wonderful experience I mean in the deep end if you like but I scrambled my way through that established their office they came back and ultimately bought the seat on the stock exchange and started into business bought bought into a small firm ultimately took it over and and did my own thing and I use some of those statistical skills to analyze stallion progeny results and that sort of thing and I'm I may have been probably one of the first to do so in Australia and that got us to acquire some of the successful stallions that we've got now everybody's on that game so we've lost our advantage but it takes the same kind of nose to find a good stallion as it does to find a good stock can I take you back to that first brood mare well that met me was schoo meld and that was the era when it was her and cappell around - very very good me as gue restarts capella ran mr. Eduardo clankers good filly and sky mail won the Victorian Oaks and at the time it was a recommendation of Bart Cummings who was my first trainer that it would be a good filly to buy and he felt that he might improve it or in a Caulfield carpool or an Epsom something like that and so we went off to buy her from the owner John Needham you might remember him we couldn't agree on the price and we were about 40,000 apart and he said look I'll toss you for the difference I said mate there's no way I'm tossing for 40,000 in the end we settled on a middle road and and I bought the mirror off him and we raised her she won a couple of races for us she won the queen of the turf I think it was and she won the Thea marks quality but she didn't get the greater heights than with the previous trainer I think there might have been a trick to hurt the previous train and you probably didn't tell us because we took the mirror away and gave it to bad Cummings but there might have been an angle that year thatwe had to train it but bad did his best and we got a couple of stakes races out of her and we then retired her to stud she was a moderate she was a moderate brood mare she produced I think one Stakes winner and a daughter her daughter produced a Stakes winner but she wasn't the greatest success we've ever had but she was a very good entry into the breeding market for me and I learned a lot from it those early years are just a matter you know you're going to lose money because you but you're going to learn and that's the price of learning mmm it's it's perhaps an unusual entry for a first-timer to go in at at that sort of level it's normally spend a little risk a little but you obviously had a philosophy back then too that you had an eye for quality rather than any sort of quantity yeah I had a couple of advisers we sat there and we talked about it and we thought we'd have a small elite band of hike Aamir's and that's the way we started and then I went bought another miracle never despair it was a very good mayor grimey a big frame me and mold me and two or three others and over time I built a bit of a broom and of course that then I then that led me to thinking well look with those nice meals I've got I should have a little place of my own to make sure I look after them as well as I should and I bought into a farm called Middlebrook Park and then once I had middle park I realized that having a few mares would be a very economic situation there and I wanted to make it a business as well as the pleasure of the business and so I then went looking for a stallion once I go to stay on the ranch I was the first day time I then said well I put a possible mayor's to support at stallion so one thing led to the other and then that had got to a point where it all got too big and then I establish Tara field it's it's that type of business where one thing leads to another [Music] you [Music] you have business philosophies or there are there certain ethos is that you live by in business at and inbreeding are the two areas crossover well the interesting thing about the horse business is your friends become your clients and the horse business and your clients become your friends as well so it's a very pleasant business to be in horse business I think but in business you know I'm all about relationships long term relationships I'm still dealing with people I was dealing with 30 years ago a lot of my staff have been with me for 25 and 30 years I have a strong network of very loyal people around me and you depend on your team I have decided the first several years of my involvement and breeding were worth it were involved a lot of mistakes it's only probably in in the middle eighties on where I had a few years of involvement that I started to see the wood from the trees it's a business there's a lot of inherent risk in it anyway because you're dealing with animals and nature and so there's built-in risk so it's a business that's about mitigating that risk and yes stallions particularly from the middle 80s on for me played a very big role in getting us to where we are today [Applause] so who is John messiahs favorite stallion well I've got to say that well the all-time favorite has to be Dane Hill because we went through an absolutely typical analysis of the type I was speaking to you about it was obvious that Northern Dancer at the time was going to be the greatest IRA ball-sized you couldn't afford a Northern Dancer son coming from Australia you could only look for a son of a son and so we went about thinking which of those sons were we going to try and zero in on for Australia and we went through a very precise analysis of each son and we determined that the one that ought to suit down here was Dan Z because he was an influence for speed and his progeny loved the grass he was probably standing in the wrong country being in America if it stood in France or England he probably would have been an even bigger success but nevertheless his figures were outstanding we zeroed in on this horse dane hill because he had a great stallions pedigree and he was obviously a smart very smart sprinter and we waited until he won his group one race and when he won the Ladbrokes bring cap I contacted the racing manager chant more times here come the day and he'll opening up and a hill that takes the Rays of the third ago Jane Hill in the lead by lady fani foot bones whistle peeping on residue connect to the rails Petain he'll Haneda they come inside the final photo day he'll buy links at half the Koala clipped mantras off and Dave hello we're not the post date he'll the winner and I think they saw these Australia Hicks from Australia approaches and thinking hello this is gonna be a good one and we offered more money than anybody else could think of offering for a son of dancy because he wasn't in vogue he was sort of the poor cousin of the Northern Dancer line I think and we got to a very advanced stage of dealing in anything and ultimately we bought the horse but we did it jointly with cool more because Roberts Sangster who I was friendly with in Australia used to see him when he came out Robert said you must go and meet my partners in Ireland John Wagner my cool more cruel I think you if you got together with them you could do something quite brilliant from shuttling point of view etc and so when I went over there and I I was negotiating Dave Eiland we talked about establishing a stallion shuttle agreement between us so if a horse came after that we thought we should shuttle this is what we do we'd buy and half each each shuttle and we set up some protocols how we would do it etc when we'd agree to all those terms they said well if you got a target and I said yeah I do have a target I'm in the process of buying Dame Hill is that that all's that just one man let's bring up the other day buddies he's a damn zip I said yep I know you might find it interesting I think your work in Australia well if you think your work in Australia okay well let's have a look at him so they came along and they said ok we'll go halves with you after a few days then they got involved in the negotiations with me and then we bought the horse and that's and of course the horse I think in my mind is probably the best horse of the last 50 years in terms of what he's done here and there I mean an incredible number of Groupon winners while Sam's our stud grandsons now it's done I mean he's been a wonderful stadium I'm glad you mentioned Dan Hill I thought your answer might have been reduced choice but given that you've brought Dan Hill up this early in the interview can you elaborate on what is a fascinating story of how he was in your clutches and left your clutches there's a lesson there to never go into a Dutch auction with somebody that's got more money than you I didn't figure that one out of the toilet but look there was a dispute from what I understand was a dispute about the horse continuing to shuttle without a break I think he'd shuttled would agree at the time the shuttle for a limited period three years and then and then he'd have a break and so we'd agree to that but the horse did shuttle very comfortably he traveled well he was a very relaxed laid-back cause and that's in his progeny as well that's about the hallmark of the Danial line and reduced line they're all the same they're great that way and that's an advantage for them but year four came along and and and the boys in Ireland said we'll look we ought to continue I mean what's the point of stopping if the horse is handling it I was nervous because I thought this was was there was the real deal and I didn't want to take any chances but turned around to my stud master stud manager at the time Peter Orton I said what do you eat and he said look cause he's hamming it so maybe we can go so we went for a fourth year and then 58 came along and we went for a fifth year and then I said at the time look you know beyond six years he's not gonna go we're gonna have to after next year we'll give this horse a break please and we got to the sixth year and they wanted to continue and I didn't and I said look I can live with if something had would have happened to this Hall I never figured it myself we've agreed to I'd agreed verbally with him you know and we were joint managers john maynard and i were joint managers of the scene again so i couldn't live with the alternative so i said the horse is not going you know at the end of the sixth year of shuttling and so we ended up with this cockamamie idea of having this auction and I felt that I valued the horse and a lot more than they did and I thought even though they have probably a lot more money than we do middle aldera field at the time they won't want to bid and so we went at this Dutch auction and so Lawrence Street who was the chief justice of New South Wales was our auctioneer in the middle here oozed the day that he didn't agree to an auction fee based on percentages because he would have collected some money but we had this this this bidding duel and in and out of the room I understand there were two rooms we were each in a room and salons was in a pew outside between the two and it was quite something we devised every detail so that everyone no one would be disadvantaged and it would be held in a very pristine environment and we had to provide the cottage Sir Laurence financial evidence as to how much money we had available before the auction so that he would be taking bids from somebody that couldn't deliver and so we'd provided our our credentials bank credentials disa Lawrence and I begged and borrowed as much as I could from friends relatives banks anybody I could find to build up the Treasury as high as it could be and and the other side obviously had an open checkbook so we got to and I had a feeling that at about 15 million for the body of the horse we as far as they would go and they got to 15 million and Robert Sangster who was a she harder in the horse I know decided that was enough for him to go on definitely did 1 out of 15 but they John Maggie knows of her strong personality he and very persuasive and he just barreled through the 15 and they got to 23 million and which was the limit of their money he'd been 23.2 or something and that was the end of it we were out loud I never calculated that that could happen I had to say and so I walked out of there and I remember my directors of our fields saying this is a wonderful day for error field we've got all this money for our 60 because we had about sixty percent equity in this horse we had kept buying shares when they became available we had a lot of belief in us I think more believed that to be fair than they had at the time but I'll tell you that the twist here so as I'm walking back towards my office from Solara streets rooms shocked I need very close to tears that's how I said that you know that's how tired I was to this horse my director said including Percy and full of vestment the other guys the other guys said this is a great day for error field we're going to be cash rich we'll be able to do this this that and the other and I said this is the worst day for us I said we're not bankers we're breeders and we've lost the Holy Grail I'll never forget that's what I said to them has it strained your relationship with Cornwall stud it did look I think I'm a guy that likes you know I like to forget and put things behind me I think otherwise you get very negative it did for a few years I you know I found it hard to face and but I think as the years have gone by I've put it behind me frankly it was probably an error on my part as to how resolved it I should have just stood my ground and we would have found another way or maybe I should have acquiesced and kept shuttling because they kept shuttling and like a horse came to harm although he died young so whether that was because of any strain that he had through the shuttle another I doubt it so I think they were probably right now it's probably wrong but I was being careful was the the greatest son of dane he'll reduce a choice the band-aid that went over the wound well the funny thing is are the first two than zero you know was a great buy to start with i remember selling him for $55,000 and the sale of the century and buying him back a year later for 2.5 billion I said if I keep doing that I'll go broke but the fact is it won the super and he was then worth the police act you know and I tried them very hard to settle it down zero owners Flying Spur who came through the ranks of our Falls or two magnificent from and I said to them look you've won the slipper he come into this one and I couldn't persuade him to come here he was got to fetch more money than zero they've got away cheap with their zero that year I think Dane wind also sold for twenty one thousand year but as soon as they did something people gonna pay for them and and I couldn't sell Flying Spur to put it together and find it myself of a group of people my wife has a limp a sentiment correct air-fuel kept the slug of it and the rest of it was friends nations which lots of people hopes I put into a team divider so keen on the voice and those two were some solace having lost the other horse and they turned out to be both very good stallions and we did really well out of them and then a long time reduce choice who ticked every box plus one and people said you've gone mad you've got two of them how can you have three sons and the one horse I said would he cut it too much of a good thing you know imagine if on that theory I wouldn't great now it's choice after testa Rossa ray dad's choices breath delayed 50 to go draws away and redoubts choices one the diamond and the big clear reduce choice by Sudha mastic again from the race then flavor but Jimmy it was worth the big wasting here because reduced choice he might be anything and reduced choice takes americano they reach the 200m Testarossa spreading very fast as moved up and has gone to the lead over my boots choice kiss that he had to pull the whip and then pins it's Testarossa clear though the third choice is coming again Testarossa has defied return states he led to their wins who no choice big Testarossa magnificent guineas he's a fantastic animal this year twenty individual states winners and his lifetime stats the best of any horse in Australia at the moment you trying to write history a little with reduce choice shuttling him this year to to France how's that exercise pain I don't think I'd have shuttled that horse to anybody else in the world virtually other than the aggregate can and and it happened quite fortuitously when I was there speaking to princess Zara the egg hands daughter it was an opportunity there was no really top horse in France and ice I sort of dropped the idea what if I was willing to shut up reduce well of course they their jaws dropped and then I said well you know I'd have to be satisfied that you're supporting very strongly with 15 or 20 years yeah you know we taught me is they agreed to do so and of course they've been true to their word they've supported the horse brilliantly some of the best news you could think I've have gone to him there's an opportunity for an Australian horse a purely Australian horse to leave a legacy worldwide America is a frontier that you've looked at and had rich success through a horse like a half a night and now Gio Ponti and an animal kingdom you've youth your ingenuity knows no boundaries well no you've got to be very careful in America because it's you know primarily dirt racing and that doesn't really fit in so well with our purely grass racing here and it also has got a slightly different conformation and they they don't adapt so well then you've got you know the drug issue over there as well in certain jurisdictions there's more lacks than others it's got to be very careful in the modern era selecting an American force that doesn't mean there aren't some great horses there in each case where we've had a bit of a go there you know the horses have ticked the boxes great horses come out of anywhere and Husson a came to me through an agent Robert Russ Ramey one day and he said I've got a horse with a downhill stats he knows I'm a stats a freak I said come on don't get me here that he said I'm telling you I've got a horse of Dave hill type stats and he sent me the information he does his homework very well problem and it took him a while to get me out of the line because the horse was American bred the place in South America but his numbers were just atom creation and I went over got really into it studying Chile embracing everything else and the son of the horses worth ago but you know I had good financial success albeit not so good on the breeding side with two horses and sweep and unbridled songs that I bought in America and brought a song didn't adapt here but I did very well I resold him back to America and I did and sweep unfortunately was a joint venture with our Japanese partners shadow we did very well with him as well although he didn't leave a legacy in Australia there were two horses that are that we did well a Don not so much because they did well here because they were good horses we bought into they did a well in America this is one of the things about shuttling it gives you two shots at it a horse might work in one place but might work in the other so it could save your bacon that way and a couple of horses you're gonna do exactly that with and they've started with Jerr Ponte and an animal kingdom animal kingdom if I can focus on him he's a terribly exciting horse anyone here's another he was another one that came through the analytical route if you like we zeroed in on his father laura1 des animaux and found it very difficult to acquire his father the owners were but in the process of analyzing him we got to know about animal kingdom obviously because that was his best produce and so kept looking at animal kingdom over time and then I was heading for the Breeders Cup this year the animal kingdom was returning after a long layoff and breakfast builders I went at the British company watch the run of a British Godfather absolutely scintillating foods come all that broke the center I need a course record for the mind and so I decided I was going to make a play for him he was owned by a racing group so they were bound to want to find a breeder to get involved he went to Dubai it was a prep race for the Dubai race and he won the richest race in the world after that he had some just wonderful performances and he's got an interesting pedigree and of a German mare by by a side that we think a lot of it's an unusual story but I think that's a horse that's gonna come out of left field and could be the spark to really work with Dana Hill because his sire comes from a family that's really worked well that Daniel and we're going to support him very very strongly this year you'll get 25 or 30 of our own beers which is as big as we've ever gone I mean where in the world would you get the roster of stallions that you can get an Australian the breeding season not only what we've got here but the best of what they've got some of the best of what they've got in Europe and America from all over the world come here it's a wonderful selection that we have it's fantastic and our sale at Eastern and even magic minions but Easter where all the internationals turn up he's about as good as there is anywhere the catalogue is fantastic anyone has anyone been it's beginning to turn up we had an important new buyers last year so it's we're up there [Music] [Applause] just about ready for the big one it said they fly they're racing in the divine world cap world Delta leading by three parts of the length the animal kingdom went up to be sick coming around the turn royal delta surrendered to animal kingdom who doubted a length and a half in front of side glance patters light into the clear lens here on the outside in the African story kingdom in front foot 200 meters listed on the inside starting to flash home will he have time Animal Kingdom leads Animal Kingdom three links in front hundred Godot and Animal Kingdom in the US the strain of combination that was a that was a very exciting moment as the che Canada over the trophy and you know yet sort of pinch yourself to believe what was happening it's one of those you know one of those great moments that you have dream moments if you had a better day at the races that was a good financial basis but if you ask me what my best day at the races ever was and that came in about 1980 81 I think it was when I won the Oaks the a jaeseok's with the physical stars and that I'd bought out of a paddock as a foal I went to New Zealand because it was a feeling called tart and TIR ta an offer by type N and I was wanting to buy that was a time about sky melt time straight after that I was collecting some quality fillies and turning him into brood mares and I heard about this filly tired had me on offer and I took a vet with me not Percy sucks on that occasion to New Zealand to inspect this tartan who'd only want a couple of trials I think in New Zealand and I was with walking towards her her paddock with a breeder and on the right hand side there's a bunch of fellas running around and I one file caught my on my eye I said what's this I said oh that's the same as an Arab a lotta filly he said it's a favorite I thought he's a sad or given the Kiwis they're good and and we kept looking at art and we found that and had a back problem that were keen to sell there one of the money and I said look that Phillies got an issue in the back you know the vet ran his fingers and she really went down on them bumpers and I said buddy if you throw that other feeling in I'm prepared to buy the two of them together and I'll pay you what you want it for this and I'll pay you a sensible price for this but I want the two of them no we can't sell easily so we went had lunch and quietly have a lunch we we waited they persuaded us we ended up buying it two together and I thought at the time I reckon we can win the arcs were this filly this little same as n filly because she had a fantastic pedigree good staying pedigree and a lever in New Zealand for another 12 months I'll get it broken in here and I won't be tempted to put her into training for a while and that's exactly what we did and then I gave it a Theo green with what and with one idea in mind the back of our minds that we try and win the Oaks with her and well that's exactly what she did because he worked yes she had a couple of starts leading up and then we ran her in the princess handicap which is the Adrian Knox today on the Saturday before the Oaks on the Wednesday and she won the princess as an outsider and that was a handicap and you would never dream that she could back up and win the Oaks on a Wednesday which is a sec weight race against at that stage the New Zealand Derby winner the New Zealand Oaks winner the Victorian Oaks winner that was the strongest field of all time strongest field of all time honestly I remember and here was us with plums supposedly this race on the Saturday and handicapped conditions you know and and here we were on the Wednesday after you know people said you're mad you can't win it said weights they're gonna just browse you but some of the strongest fillies of all time here anyway we won the race but the beautiful thing about that one is you know when a plan comes off when you sort of taken a chance thought about something and it exactly come off it's homemade on the outside and stars aren't settling down with all in fleshing of the insider stars and home-made go for the mark line stars on has beaten and I have to say that's probably the biggest thrill I've had because it was my first Groupon win and it was a filly coming from nowhere with no fanfare and just it came off you know a dream came off a plan came off I think John one thing that plenty of people admire about you is that you've got a drive to want to make this industry or sport should I say sport of kings a better industry or a better sport for all of those participants you involved in the Australian Racing Board tvN's Board the pattern committee and chairman of racing New South Wales what what drives you to be involved at that political level well in 1985 Colin Hayes had been lobbying Bob Hawke prior to that to bring our taxation laws in line with New Zealand they had a far more advantageous depreciation provision for breeding stock and it put us out of play and virtually they'd end up with all good mares because they could write them off more quickly and Bob did the lobbying with a prime minister and with others but Colin did and I was charged with writing the submission to Treasury and so they quickly put me on the blood was breeders Association they called me the treasurer for a month or two while I went there with a treasurer has had on and went to Canberra and I went to Canberra and made my submission to David Morgan who ultimately was the victory of the Treasury became the chief executive of West Bank at David Mormon and we laugh now about this young whippersnapper turning up and trying to you know ask your way but my way through anyway the Bob had done the job at the political level but you have to also persuade of course the public service the bureaucracy we did this wrote this paper and we got taxation laws changed to be equal to New Zealand just a level playing field now all and that was the beginning of the modern the evolution of the breeding industry in Australia and promise the prime minister at the time that I you know I was building airfield I was beginning to build out a field I said one I'd like you to come and open it up for us Bob walk that he did and I said I'm gonna if that happens I'm gonna buy a really important stallion and bring it to Australia because that's what it deserves and that's what I'll be doing and that's what led me to buy kenmare and then Dane Hill because we were put on a playing field where we could compete that was the moment where a lot of people like myself got very involved and applied quite a lot of resources to the industry and we started rebuilding some of those farms in the Hunter Valley into reading modern farms akin to those that exist in Kentucky and Newmarket Chenery is up to that point you know racing and breeding was pretty well a bit of a hobby a sidekick Ferb she farm as a cattle farm as it really wasn't an industry unto itself as such and that was the beginning of it and a lots happened here in the breeding industry as you can see you've now got the biggest and most influential British in the world Dolly and cool war and Japanese have got a stake here and the owner can send Samir's down here it's big it's become first class industry really and a great employer and also a quite a bit exported I think a lot of us got together and got the place going on the breeding side of it and ultimately I became chairman of a federal blood horse breeders Association and we merged it with us horse and we charged the industry a percentage of sales to be able to give us a chance to promote the Australian horse overseas and now we have an international buying bench of of some stature so the job has been done on the breeding I think the racing has to follow and it's got a lot of natural advantages the great franchise in Australia for racing a lot of people have a latent interest in racing here and we've got to try and somehow rather embrace them and bring them in and we've got to lift the standards as much as we can we need international style carnivals they've got one in Victoria we haven't got one in New South Wales the racing now New South Wales has a job to do we've got a lift ourselves to the Victorian standard which is first-class I mean you're the Spring Carnival is one of the great carnivals of the world beyond doubt and what I'm doing now with the team they'll have a dray senior South Wales is trying to emulate that in a slightly different way the Sydney different culture and Sydney different style but nevertheless have just as important a carnival here in the autumn we won't don't want to compete with a spring because we don't want to do anything to harm the Victorian Spring it's a it's an asset for the whole of Australia is it time do you think for the unification of the Australian racing and breeding industry and at a federal minister to perhaps be appointed there's never been more cooperation and I think that started from an association I had with Michael Duffy I've got an enormous respect for that man he's a true racing enthusiast the first man I went to see when I became chairman of racing his earth Wales was I paid a visit I flew over to Victorian paid a visit to Michael and said Michael this is a chance for the two states to work together can we discuss some of the mutual matters a mutual interest in I laid out a few of them and he laid out a few of them and funnily enough we agreed about a lot of things not everything but we've read about a lot of things and we agreed with work together to achieve some of those and and we have and we are still and of course since then Rob Ralston's taken over and I've had two relationship with him over the years and we worked very well together and so I can see New South Wales and Victoria working closely together it might never get to a formal national body but there's a lot of consultation and a lot of work and a lot of mutual respect that that exists now between the various you know you know jurisdictions personally John it seems that life couldn't be any happier for you at the moment you've got a beautiful wife Christine for very successful children in their own right now grandkids but could have been a very very different story as I understand it if you'd not been brave enough to go on a blind date a double blind date I think it might have been now all those years ago yeah well that's a funny story too I'd come back from Switzerland when I opened that European office and worked there for a year I'd come back and I lost contact with a few other friends and what-have-you and I ran into one of my mates and he said I organize a blind date for you with the number two in Miss Universe I said what so he said that's what I'm doing for you we'll go out a nice day where do you want to go I said well actually there's a play on at North Sydney we should go to this play we can have a bit of dinner afterwards etc so with weird Miss Universe please he had some other girl that lived in the set a friend of his and a girlfriend Vee has lived in the same flat as this runner-up in this universe as it turns out I turn up there and the number two in Miss Universe is not available because some boyfriend from Melbourne had turned up and she was more interested in the one she knew than the one she didn't know and there's only one other girl in the flat and this was this secretary girl it used to be a secretary in town and had the little alcove she could only afford to rent a little Elko from the this group of girls because she was on a very low wage and that was my wife Christine but nobody told me that she wasn't the number two in Miss Universe so I fell in love with a concept of means you know the number two of Miss Universe setup with them so up comes Christine I don't know that she's not number two in Miss Universe as far as I said she was and that gave her a pretty good a pretty good start but anyway the funny thing is we hit it off enormously well I saw there every day for six weeks I would engage at the end of six weeks I got married three months later three or four months later and that was 41 years ago love at first sight on false pretense here on false pretenses there you go and for children who you must be very proud of and my eldest her first child as a doctor she's based at the orange base hospital and she's doing very well there Paul second next child is a trainer who trained 51 in his last season and he's doing well he's the only one in the business at the moment the next son is Michael who's a successful fund manager he's a financial guy came through the same route as me I don't know that he's gonna spill off into breeding like I did I think you'll stay with what he's doing but he loves the horses and and he's a good in America they call him a good handicapper because he's very good on form here not a bit and and then our daughter Susie is the Morning Show Channel Nine's Morning Show correspondent in Hollywood in LA so she lives in LA and reports on the goings in the movie in Hollywood so so they're all in absolutely totally divergent walks of life those kids they change a lot yeah entirely and of course they say about grandchildren changing your life but you don't believe it until it happens and it is an entirely different feeling having your own children and it's a complete it's a fantastic thing and my sound corny but it is now a quirky one for you John the racing gods are smiling upon you on this very day and I've decided that you can own one of two race horses from the start of their career and this racing God is particularly happy with you because he's given you the choice between Black Caviar or Maccoby diva who do you choose no I'd have to take a cab yeah he would yes I think it didn't have to take a caveat we can't believe it by the way spent the first 18 months of a life at her field she did the early rearing over she has our brand on it yeah but and she's a great man a great mirror and what an exciting to win has Melbourne cups you know your dream is a it's a killer winning those melbourne cups but Black Caviar something very special I don't think we'll see another one like it for quite some time I've got a feeling we might see a night with John Messara for a long time thank you for spending time with us we've appreciated it and look forward to catching you again soon pleasure thanks John Cheers [Music] [Music] you

Channel: Arrowfield Stud

Views: 9,886

Rating: 4.9402986 out of 5

Keywords: john messara, arrowfield, danehill, redouteschoice, thoroughbred

Id: Sl9dEVWdnaA

Length: 49min 4sec (2944 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 29 2016