BLAST FROM THE PAST
MARK McNAMARA - Commentator
MARK McNAMARA - COMMENTATOR
Spending Cup and Show Week cooped up in a small booth delivering running commentaries on dozens of races sounds stressful. Just imagine trying to keep track of the hundreds of horses and associated drivers, jockeys and trainers. Race caller Mark McNamara has been doing this for so long, he makes it sound easy. This is his seventh year as the voice of Canterbury's biggest racing week of the year. Before coming to New Zealand in 2009, he spent 16 years commentating in New South Wales and was the State's top harness-racing caller.
He has loved the buzz of harness and thoroughbred racing for as long as he can remember. "I think it was the colours that got me into this," he says. "To this day, racing colours are my life." Mark's finely honed talent for meshing colour with memory is crucial to his career. Before he shifted to New Zealand to become Canterbury's race caller, he spent hours drawing trainers' colours to help memorise "the who's who" of the industry. He also frequently uses colours to memorise horses' names. Ten minutes before a race, he will eyeball the horses as they come into the parade ring, look at the colours of each in turn and say their name over and over again until he knows them by heart. It only takes a few minutes. By the time he is done, he barely needs to look at a race book.
"I had pages of colours down as a kid. I used to watch races from a young age. While other kids worshipped footballers, one of my heroes was a guy that called the races in Sydney, Johnny Tapp. You could say I was a bit of a strange kid!"
Over coffee at their home in rural Weedons, Mark's wife, Katie, chips in to suggest her spouse can still be "pretty random" at times - in a good way. The couple reminisce good-naturedly about the time Mark once called part of a race in the voice of Australian sports commentator Ray Warren. The word play was sparked by one of the horses in the field, Tagataese, as in Sam Tagataese, of the Cronulla Sharks. "He's a huge die-hard Cronulla Sharks fan," laughs Katie, "which is a bit sad, since they never win the premiership."
Mark starts his preparation for Cup and Show Week in September, when the lead-up races get underway. He studies the fields and form in order to be well informed. These lead-up races all contribute to what happens during Cup Week. On Cup Day itself, Mark will arrive at Addington Raceway an hour and a half before the first race and take a stroll through the stables, picking up scraps of information he can used from trainers and drivers.
Their will be nine races to call before the New Zealand Cup. "The first race is a two-mile trot, the same distance as the Cup, so that helps get me into gear for that,. There is so much going on that day...before you know it, you are at the Cup." Calling the big race requires more than an ability to utter a high word-rate-per minute. Mark suggests knowing how to modulate pace and use pitch are key requirements, too. "If one hose is miles in front, there is no point carrying on too much. As the race gets close to the finish, you naturally hype it up. The race dictates how it is called."
Both he and Katie will be dressing up in style for Cup Day. Mark will suit up and wear a once-a-year boutonniere, while Katie will wear a dress made by an Australian designer and a hat by Christchurch milliner Maria Wright. Katie's mother, Gail, is coming over from Australia especially to look after the couple's two children, William, nearly three and Bronte, 5 months, so Katie can sit in the Commentary box with Mark. "I get nervous, too," Katie says. "I know how much it means to him to do a good job...If he mucks up in a race, he is so dirty on himself, but he does an exceptionally good job on Cup Day."
The old maxim - "you're only as good as your last race" - is always uppermost in Mark's mind. Reflecting on past embarrassments, such as the time he let slip a little scream as Terror To Love stormed home to win the New Zealand Trotting Cup in 2011, keeps him on his toes. To this day, that moment makes him cringe - and also to chuckle at his own expense.
Mark has a pretty wry sense of humour that comes through in his commentary style, too. "There was a horse called Wedgie racing at Ashburton a couple of years ago. I remember saying 'if that horse wins, I am going to call it in a high-pitched voice as it crosses the line'. It did win and I was true to my word. I like to be a bit different."
Some horses' names crack him up, such as Puma Pants, or Gotashotaway - the name given to a two-year-old that broke through a fence to get a neighbouring mare. He used to have a love-hate relationship with a trotter called She Sell Sea Shells. "Try saying it fast!"
The New Zealand Trotting Cup is always the biggest race of the year and it comes with added pressure. Yet, as Mark observes, it is only one of up to 70 races he will be calling that week. "I take one at a time. You cannot learn them too far ahead - there is too much on - so I will go to Cup Day on Tuesday and then come home and forget it. The I will focus on Riccarton on Wednesday, the Coupland's Bakeries Mile. The following day I will be at Ashburton Raceway, then Addington again on Friday for another 12 races. Then it wraps up at Riccarton, another massive day. It all goes by pretty fast."
Last year, Mark just about ended up chain-chugging throat lozenges to keep his voice going through so many races. But he no longer eats at races after a bad experience choking on some hastily eaten hot chips while calling a race at Bathurst in New South Wales five years ago. "It was about 200 metres from the finish. I had a cough and a splutter to clear (my throat) and called the end of the race." On Cup Day, he will eat breakfast only until the job is done.
Mark's enthusiasm for the track from a young age had its occasional downsides. At 15, he was photographed by the Sydney Morning Herald holding a betting ticket and race book. The photo went on the front page as part of a scandal story on underage gambling. The article included details of where Mark's family lived. It started a torrent of outrage, with Mark's parents copping a lot of the heat. The silver lining for Mark was being offered a tour of Warwick Farm by its chief steward, including an opportunity to talk to Johnny Tapp.
From the age of four or five, Mark used to accompany his father, Mick, to Sunday race meetings. The family home was in the south Sydney suburb of Cronulla and Warwick Farm was the nearest racecourse. It had three grandstands, including an older stand, usually near-empty. Mark remembers sneaking up there with his dad to practise race calling. If there was no racing at Warwick Farm, they would sometimes go to meetings at other local courses, including Randwick, Rosehill Gardens and Canterbury Park.
"Most Saturdays, if Dad was not working, we would go to the races. He was a five-dollar punter who just loved racing. We would go at midday and spend the afternoon watching races. I cannot say why I got hooked on race calling. I even went away from it for a while at high school, when it really wasn't cool to be into it." That all changed one day at a Randwick race meeting. Still only 15 at the time, Mark got talking to a judge who officiated at the Bulli trots and was offered an opportunity to become a trial caller. From then on, Friday nights were spent at Harold Park practising race calling in a spare commentary box and every second Saturday was spent at trials. "It was a great grounding, though it wore out Dad's car; he used to drive me everywhere."
Easter Saturday 1996 at Nowra Racecourse and Moruya thoroughbreds in November that same year are two race days he will never forget...his first official days as a race caller for the thoroughbreds and the harness racing. At Nowra, there were seven races that day and the first was won by a horse called Testaccio. "His colours were dark blue with a white diamond sash. I can still see it."
The following year, Mark was taken on as a radio and race-calling cadet at Radio 2KY and spent the next 12 years calling race meetings throughout New South Wales, travelling 1600km a week to various meets. "For the Carnival of Cups harness-racing series, I'd go pretty much right across the state from Temora in Riverina to Leeton to a little place called Eugowra. It usually has a population of about 600, but that triples for big race meetings. They grow a lot of canola there - hence the Canola Cup." Mark was back in Eugowra last month catching up with old friends. "It is the people that make the job."
By 2005, a few years after Radio 2KY had been acquired by Sky, Mark was promoted to number two harness caller in New South Wales. Of all the races he called there, Smooth Satin winning his fourth Bathurst Cup in 2005 was perhaps the most memorable. "He came out of retirement to win that fourth time and he won easily - it was an emotional time. It has always stuck in my mind. The trainer-driver colours are locked in: red and dark blue spots and hoop sleeves." Eventually, Mark wound up as the state's top harness caller, officiating not only at Bathurst but also at other big tracks such as Penrith and Menangle.
In March 2009, in the weeks following the sudden death of popular Canterbury race caller Darren Tyquin, Mark started thinking about making the move to New Zealand. "I'd always loved New Zealand racing, especially Cup Week, and I'd always wanted to call the Kaikoura Cup...To cut a long story short, one thing lead to another and I got the job."
He readily admits that coming from jumps-free Sydney to a week of hurdles and steeples at Riccarton that year was a terrifying prospect. He spent hours studying form ahead of his first race here, the Sydenham Hurdles, but still recalls "shaking like a leaf" at the start. The sheer length of the Koral Steeplechase - 4200 metres - was another new experience. "I built too early!"
He is unlikely to forget the 2009 Grand National Hurdles at Riccarton, when runaway leader Rioch fell towards the end of the race, then got up again only to walk into the path of another horse. "Fortunately, no-one was hurt and the horses were okay." In his time here, other challenges have included commentating through snow at Methven, fog at Addington, streakers and, inevitably, earthquakes (one just before a race at Addington and another during a race at Riccarton; apparently the horses did not notice).
One of the perks of this unusual job for Mark is getting plenty of time off during the week to spend with his family. William already has his own cart pony, Bloss, and will no doubt learn how to drive when he is a little older. The toddler already knows his father has a special job. "Horses!" he exclaims, when asked to name it.
The connection with horses goes beyond the commentary box and pet ponies. Mark has had notable success with his own horses in New Zealand. When he first came here, he did some driving work for trainer Mark Jones and the two have kept up an owner-trainer association. "We've had good success. Union Buster won a race. Champagne Franco, my pride and joy, won a race at the first start. The syndicate horses have won races for us, and Heretic Franco, trained in Invercargill by Tony Barron. The credit all goes to Mark and Tony and their staff."
Mark and Katie share a background in the racing industry, Katie having worked for Harness Racing New South Wales and also as a graphic designer for Harness Racing New Zealand. Both enjoy owning horses. Champagne Franco, now a broodmare is due to foal. Mark's first galloper Assertive was lucky enough to win a race when trained in the North Island by Steven March.
A log term dream is to call races in Dubai, but, for now, Mark cannot think of anything better than calling it at Cup and Show Week. "Horses are my life, I love it."
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What is your favourite racehorse name?
I don't have one in particular, but I do enjoy clever and witty names that owners have put a bit of time into. Names like Not Tonite; its breeding was Postponed out of Arousing!
Are you a betting man?
No, I am far too mean to bet.
How long does it take to choose your outfit for Cup and Show Week?
Not very long. Mr personal stylist, my wife, picks it for me.
On which shops do you rely?
My Cup Day attire always comes from Barkers. The lovely team at Riccarton Mall always help me pick a winning Fashion in the Field combination, even though I'm more heard than seen during Cup Week.
What are you reading?
I haven't read a book since school other than a racebook.
First thing you do when you arrive home?
After a late night meeting. I throw everything on the kitchen bench and then get changed. I sit down and enjoy dinner while watching TV, generally the last of the Rugby League game during the season.
Favourite bar?
The Springston Hotel. With two young kids, I don't get out a whole heap, so a family-friendly pub is right up my alley.
Favourite Christchurch discovery?
Willowbank Wildlife Reserve. It's the perfect size to keep a toddler entertained and is a great afternoon out.
People might not know that...I'm a massive plane nerd, so much so I half completed a private pilot's licence in Australia before moving to New Zealand in 2009.
Biggest extravagance?
Owning horses. If they didn't eat and breed, I would have a lot more money. It's an addiction I can't shake.
Credit: Kim Newth writing in Avenues Nov 2015
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