It’s not every harness racing driver who gets to steer home her first winner with her sister and mentor right by her side.
But that was the case for first season Broken Hill reinswoman Stevie Robinson whose breakthrough race win last Saturday night was part of a photo-finish family quinella with her much more experienced sister Cassie.
“It was pretty awesome hitting the line. If you look at the photo, Cassie’s laughing – but I’ve got my ‘race face’ on – and we really didn’t know who had got there!” Stevie said.
“I was on Maythehorsebwithu (Always A Virgin – Seyah Tess (Die Laughing), my favorite horse and Cassie was on the stablemate Dribblabill. He’s got a big boof head and Cassie did say she thought she’d got me by a head,” she said.
“But when the result came in and I’d got there with ‘Jed’, I told her I’d beaten her by a lip!”
Maythehorsebwithu trained by Don Pimm gives a memorable first win for driver Stevie Robinson, pictured with her husband Tobias Hack (Photo: Tim Gimbert Images)
The Robinson sisters are part of the team at the stables of veteran Broken Hill trainer Don Pimm – Cassie has been there “since she was a kid”, but Stevie is a relative newcomer.
They’re also the daughters of dedicated Broken Hill club secretary Tracey Robinson, who is the prime mover ensuring the success of the outback NSW club’s annual summer season – and its feature meeting, the Carnival of Cups on March 12.
“Mum absolutely just lives and breathes it – the trots are her life – and Cassie has always been horse mad. But I couldn’t have cared less when we were kids,” Stevie said.
“I was interested in friends, socialising, school and sport. And horses didn’t count because they took me away from my other sport,” she laughed.
“But basically, Cassie and Don ended up with too many horses a few years back, to put it politely, and Don’s no spring chicken now, so Cassie first asked me to help out on race nights.
“It’s just gone from there and I’ve gradually got more and more involved from strapping on race nights, to them giving me nice quiet horses to jog, then starting to do fast work a few years back.”
The 29-year-old (she celebrated her birthday just a few days after her first winner) said her decision to become a reinswoman was prompted by the limited pool of race drivers in the Silver City.
“We rely really heavily on the visiting drivers from Mildura and they’re fantastic, but it does get to the stage where if we get too many horses from the stable in the race, it’s tricky to find drivers,” she said.
“So l said to Cassie I was thinking about getting my licence, and she told me to go for it.”
But that was only the beginning. The isolation of the Western NSW mining city meant considerable effort to comply with licencing requirements and Stevie clocked up plenty of miles for trial drives – to Globe Derby (570km), Mildura (300km) and Ouyen (400 kilometres).
“The trainers were absolutely fantastic in supporting me, so I got some really great experience at different tracks and different horses, but it was still pretty daunting when I finally made it to the races at our first meeting,” Stevie said.
“I was that nervous and I felt so sick but there’s nothing like driving your own horse, and when I got him around safely, I was as happy as Larry from there,” she said.
“My first drive was a runner-up, and that was a bit of a ‘holy crap’ moment! Cassie gave me some feedback and hints about my drives, and I applied them this week and got my win. She’s been great – I couldn’t have asked for a better teacher.”
The Pimm-Robinson team has nine in work and Stevie estimates there are around 30 locally-based horses.
“Obviously we could always do with more, it’s always our biggest issue. If all the horses in town were racing, we would just scrape through for the required 30 for a (five race) meeting, but with injuries and spells that really just doesn’t usually ever quite work out,” she said.
“We’ve got a good number of horses up here – and there’s one trainer who looks like he might be coming back to the area, so the signs are good. We’re always on the precipice but the Mildura trainers are fantastic in supporting us and helping us to hold up numbers each week.
“We have great sponsor support, and a dedicated bunch of people behind the scenes who work so hard and countless hours to make it all happen. I think that’s the best part.
“It brings people together, a lot of people are active and involved and we’ve got a community that just loves the sport – it makes all the hard work worthwhile.”
And if being part of the unique Broken Hill harness racing experience is on your bucket list, the club’s March 12 Carnival of Cups TAB meeting is a must! It will no doubt again attract the interest of visiting interstate trainers with the $16,000 Rocky Baker Memorial the feature, and all other races on the program with stakes upwards of $8500.
Terry Gange
NewsAlert PR Mildura