Kim Woods, Narrandera Argus

Peter Clancy will cut the 80th anniversary cake at the CopRice Leeton Cup on Saturday April 20 and mark eight decades of involvement with the club.

Octogenarian Peter Clancy is simply “Mr Racing” – the racehorse trainer and breeder has been the mainstay and face of the industry in the Leeton area for more than 60 years.

He has had races and a function room at Leeton racecourse named after him, he has underpinned local meetings with up to seven runners on a program, his late wife Nerrida was secretary of the Leeton Jockey Club for over 20 years and the couple have been employers and mentors to over 30 young apprentices over the decades at their Corbie Hill stables.

As one of NSW’s oldest full-time trainers, Clancy’s bush stable has statistics that not many in the industry can emulate – 5036 starters for 631 wins and 1198 places, including 104 wins on his hometown track.

His best track for wins is Wagga with 138 while former apprentice Brad Clark has ridden 76 winners for his former master.

A plain looking brown gelding bred and trained by Clancy called Qualitary was his biggest winner, notching up 19 wins and 28 places from 81 starts, followed by the filly Sporting Queen with 15 wins, 12 placings and 46 starts. The highest stakes earner for the stable was Zarvista with 12 wins for $186,000 in prizemoney.

In 2017, Clancy was recognised for his contribution to country racing with the Simon Nivison Special Achievement Award at Racing NSW’s Country and Provincial Awards – the first trainer to do so.

Peter’s father, Norman “Burley” Clancy, was a racehorse owner and president of the Leeton Jockey Club.

As a young lad Peter helped him maintain the track and facilities at the Leeton racecourse and was rewarded at the age of 15 with a retired racehorse to learn to ride on.

Riding at 10 stone, Peter did the track work for his brother and trainer, John Clancy, and embarked on a career as an amateur jockey.

Peter Clancy first appears in the LJC record books in the 1950s riding a horse owned by his father called Red Meggs, to second in a five-furlong race and backing up with a win at the Leeton meeting on November 12, 1955.

He went on to hit his straps after that meeting riding three winners at Ardlethan, including at the picnic race club’s inaugural meeting, and four winners at Deniliquin.

“There were two-day picnic meetings nearly everywhere. During the winter almost every race meeting at Wagga and Albury had a Corinthian (amateur race) and there was one in Sydney each August,” Peter said.

“Red Meggs was a smart horse and taught me to ride – in those days there were no gates, just a strand across in front of the horses. Red Meggs was always quick out of the gates.”

Some horses were raced twice at the same meeting, running in the Corinthian first to relax them.

The trainers and jockeys in those amateur races competed for large trophies donated by the wealthy Riverina graziers.

“There was a little bloke, Arthur “Bubba” Steele, who had been an apprentice in Melbourne and worked at Yanco working with trainer Stan Gorrie. His claim to fame was he was the only jockey who could carry a battery as he was deaf. He started me off, teaching me to be a horseman, and I now teach that to my apprentices,” Peter said.

He transitioned to training around 1960 and named his Corbie Hill property, Sona Lodge, after the mare Sona who won 22 races from 44 starts, and was Clancy’s first horse to race in Sydney.

“I started training in the days when there were no gates and some of the early barriers had no gates on front, just a strand across the front of the horses.”

One of his most successful stallions over the years was Surrey Flight, a prepotent sire who had four winners at the 1993 Leeton Cup six race meeting for Sona Lodge – Flight Director, Tid’s Reject, Lolly Gobble and Corbie Kid. One year the sire ranked eighth in Australia for his runners to winner’s ratio.

The Surrey Flight progeny were highly sought after in the showjumping world once they were finished racing with one horse reaching Olympic standard.

At its peak, Sona Lodge had a brood mare band of around 30 with horses raced in red with a white Maltese cross, later changed to green with brown spots.

Peter and Nerrida were mentors and guardians to 31 young apprentices over the decades.

The couple also devoted much of their spare time to the LJC, maintaining the track and surrounds, administrative duties and travelling to conferences.

One of the best riders in Sydney, Tim Clark, started out under Clancy and was named as Leeton Sportsperson of the Year. He was flocked by well-wishers in 2008 after winning the Wagga Gold Cup and rated it as a career highlight in front of the 12,000 strong crowd.

SDRA champion jockey with 399 career wins, John Kissick, and former Country apprentice of the year Brad Clark were also apprenticed to Clancy. Brad was asked to ride Valley Worrier at Rosehill and landed his first metropolitan win in 1999 – Clancy had not only given his blessing for Brad to take the ride, but also drove him and his parents to Sydney to see him being legged up.

Damien Bradbery scored a winning double in Adelaide in 1994 after being loaned by Clancy to top Adelaide trainer Russell Cameron. Damien won the SDRA apprentice premiership, after arriving at Sona Lodge for the 1992-93 racing season without having ridden a winner.

“Put John Kissick on a horse and he is a genius – of all the apprentices he loved racing. He has broken his back and pelvis and he is still riding because he’s got that passion,” Clancy said.

“As a young jockey you must have passion and purpose.”

Peter’s current apprentice Caine Stuart admires the trainer, saying he treats all his apprentices with respect.

“He’s good with teaching things – give and take with the horses, he loves to talk to the horses. He watches replays of my rides with me, reinforcing the positives and that is what you want to give you confidence. I have improved so much since I came here,” Caine said.

Clancy is firm about teaching respect. “To me, respect is the greatest word in the English language. There was (one apprentice) who I thought I might not have got through to him. I went in the jockey’s room one day, he had his colours off and he had the word ‘respect’ tattooed over his heart. I’m really proud of that and it floored me.”

He is well loved by almost all his apprentices with photos of their weddings and children adorning the walls of his home. Clancy is concerned about the injury and fatality rate of female jockeys, and believes all apprentices should learn gymnastics as part of their training to increase flexibility and learn how to balance and tumble.

When it comes to great horses, Our Traz, East Wind and Zarvista are front of mind for the trainer.

His brother John trained Our Traz, a horse which was destined to be a show hack but a blemish saw him switched to racing, and he went on to claim both country and city wins in the 1960s.

East Wind won her first start at the Wagga Cup Carnival in 2008.

Zarvista won a 2007 trial by seven lengths before devastating his rivals to win the Wagga maiden by five lengths.

That year Zarvista missed the start at Canterbury by six lengths and stormed home to win the General Aviaton Underwriting Handicap (1100m). In the lead up the horse had notched up five wins from eight starts. Zarvista finished second in the Wagga Town Plate in 2008 and was owned by David Boots and Pat Foley.

Sprinter Sporting Queen is another favourite, notching up wins at Leeton and Wagga Cup Carnivals, including the 1999 Leeton Coprice Crystal Challenge by four and a half lengths.

Owned by the Luder and Nott families, the filly was 2001-2002 SDRA Horse of the Year and 2001-2002 Albury Horse of the Year, with 46 career starts for 15 wins.

“I love sprinters – I like them ridden up on the speed. All of the horses by Surrey Flight were sprinters but Ponderosa, who we got from Tommy Smith, broke the track record at Wagga for a mile,” Clancy said.

“At one stage we had 10 last start winners in the stables and I was pretty proud that day.”

In 2008, Clancy claimed a quinella at the Albury Gold Cup carnival in the $40,000 City Handicap when Stralara edged out stablemate Mister Unique – the first in the race’s 31-year history. He had previously won the race in 2002 with Sporting Queen.

He has won several Cups on his home track including the inaugural Coprice Crystal Challenge for two-year-olds. In recent years he has won the Leeton Cup in 2005 with Hanwood, 2008 and 2009 with Stralara, 2010 with Princess Lilly, Soward in 2013 and My Southern Slew in 2014.

There have been a few hiccups along the way including the outbreak of equine influenza in 2007, resulting in race meetings abandoned, horses couldn’t be worked on the racecourse and mares couldn’t be taken to the stallions for breeding. As meetings at Albury, Wagga and Leeton were abandoned, Peter faced a worrying time and told The Irrigator “being a bush stable, we can’t float the horses into the Leeton track to work them. It’ll set racing in NSW back a fair bit.”

Peter and Nerrida were paid a certain amount each day to train their horses while racing was curtailed.

Racing continued, albeit with restrictions, regulations and no public, during Covid-19.

Leeton businessman David Boots has been a great client of Clancy’s along with Cootamundra vet Phil Nott and the local Rainbow Ladies Syndicate.

He keeps his costs down by sourcing feed locally, employing apprentices and a part-time stable hand/track worker. Ryan Pendergast, Narrandera, does all the handling and breaking.

Clancy paid tribute to the first-class track and facilities at Leeton. His horses do their fast work there once a week.

His son Greg helps out him out with the horses and daughter Tania with the book work. In 2021, Peter was honoured by the LJC with the naming of the function centre as Clancy’s Lodge during the Leeton Cup meeting.

He was also honoured that year at the Ardlethan picnic race meeting with life membership of the Ardlethan Picnic Race Club.

There has never been any pressure to be an early riser as Clancy is the only one working horses on the Leeton track each week.

Today, at age 86 he has seven horses in work and races once or twice a fortnight.

“I don’t drink so don’t socialise much but am part of a very big racing family – I can go anywhere in racing and know everyone.

“It has been a wonderful life – I actually enjoyed the riding more than training. I do get great gains out of teaching apprentices to ride – I am that proud of the likes of Tim Clark. I did say I would retire when I’m 90 but I don’t want to sit here with nothing to do so I’m going to keep doing what I’m doing.” 

This article appeared in the Narrandera Argus, 11 April 2024.