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Horse Racing: Australia's leading trainer Darren Weir has collected his seventh Group 1 of the season with Humidor winning the Australian Cup at Flemington.
SHE’S the fresh young face of racing and the first woman in the 165-year history of the South Australian Jockey Club to lead the stuffy former “men only” organisation.
What’s more, Bodelle Francis is smart, ambitious and determined to turn around the fortunes of her club and the racing industry.
The 33-year-old general manager of the Francis Group of companies – which owns several SA hotels, including the German Arms at Hahndorf – took the reins of the SAJC just six weeks ago.
She will be in charge of her first Adelaide Cup during Monday’s running of South Australia’s most famous race.
“I’m young, enthusiastic, I come from business, I love racing and this industry is changing,” she told the Sunday Mail.
“Ours is not just an old man’s club any more. There are plenty of young vivacious people – not just females – getting involved.”
A crowd of about 10,000 is expected at Morphettville for the 148th Adelaide Cup. That figure is well down on the glory years when the event was held in May, but the new chairwoman remains upbeat.
“I always like to stay eternally optimistic and I’m looking at that we’ve got all these fabulous new initiatives and perfect weather – and whatever our crowd number is, people are going to have a great day,” said the former Australian Hotels Association’s National Young Hotel Manager of the Year.
New SA Jockey Club chairwoman Bodelle Francis at Morphettville Racecourse.Source:News Corp Australia
“Adelaide in March is very competitive, but our story is you don’t need a lot of money to come to the Adelaide Cup. You can do it as cheaply or as extravagantly as you wish, from $25 to $450. And then you can buy a champion at the Magic Millions (yearling sales) after the Cup!”
The Jockey Club is looking to cast aside a tag as the “Jokey Club” after several years of multimillion-dollar losses.
Ms Francis, involved with racing from a young age through her family’s Finniss Lodge Thoroughbreds stud and training stables, said under her stewardship the club would look at all aspects of the business.
“In our family businesses we don’t do anything to lose money and we know hospitality – it’s all about the customer,” she added.
“Getting crowds to the track is a priority and ... we’ll make sure we’re doing the right things financially.”
Ms Francis was the youngest ever SAJC board member, and only the third woman after Judy Morton (1996) and Sharon Forrester-Jones (2002), when she joined, aged 27, in 2011.
Women now hold senior roles at every level of the sport and participation from the jockeys’ room to the boardroom is only set to grow.
Clare Lindop is one of Australia’s top jockeys, with more than 1000 race wins.Source:News Corp Australia
Frances Nelson, QC, is in her seventh year as chair of Thoroughbred Racing SA, racing’s board of control, while Clare Lindop is among the nation’s best jockeys. The winner of more than 1000 races – including the 2006 Adelaide Cup – will ride top local hope Mail It In in Monday’s Cup.
She will be joined in the $400,000 group 2 feature by Jamie Kah, winner of the SA jockey premiership in 2012-13, Kate Walters (Puccini), Nikita Beriman (Mujadale) and Emily Finnegan (Chestnut Charlie).
In SA, more than a third of riders are female and more than 80 women hold a training licence.
Originally published as Racing’s fresh start as woman takes reins