For all the problems that this year has posed, the Melbourne Cup remains the race that will stop the nation. At this time of the year, the hoopla of AFL Grand Final is held gives way to another sport that has long had the power to stop the nation.
For newcomers to Australia the reverence with which horseracing is held at this particular time of the year is not a little puzzling. Yet the Australian long held love for horseracing has rubbed off on the new arrivals and Greeks have been no exception.
For the Greeks who came in the 1950s and 60s, horseracing was not something that was the norm. Yet it is a sport that has that they have taken to just as the diaspora Greeks in the United States and Southern Africa, says Nicholas Tzaferis whose family has long been involved in horseracing. There have been many notable Greeks, he told Neos Kosmos, who have played an important role in Australian horseracing.
For a start, Mr Tzaferis, who is also the General Manager of Corporate Communications for Tabcorp, has a cousin, James, who is TV broadcaster for Racing.com and whose partner is a jockey as well.
“Our family has owned and raced horses. It is an industry that brings a lot of people together in the quest to find the right horse who will be successful,” he said.
“To the Greek migrants, horseracing was seen as a part of Australian culture. Many found it was a way to connect to Australian culture, they adopted it and they have loved it. It has become part of the DNA for a lot of us. After all, mounted horseracing was part of the ancient Olympics,” said Mr Tzaferis.
Greeks in Australian racing today include sports administrator Peter V’Landys who is the CEO of Racing New South Wales as well as the chairman of the Australian Rugby League Commission. There is also Caulfield Cup winning trainer Tony Vasil, Sydney racing radio pundit Andrew Georgiou and big race winning owner Tony Pistikakis among many others.
In Victoria, Bill “Papa” Papazaharoudakis is the Stable Manager of Lindsay Park which is one of the country’s leading training operations and a trainer of his own right. He recently moved with the group to Flemington from Adelaide.
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“Here in Victoria the scale is bigger. The biggest and the best racing, probably in the world, is here,” Mr Papazaharoudakis told Neos Kosmos. “Horseracing is one of the biggest industries in Australia.”
“In my father’s time they Greeks used to punt but with my generation we do it for the love of the horses. It is a lot of work, seven days a week,” said Mr Papazaharoudakis.
Peter Gelagotis Racing (PGR)is one of the leading thoroughbred training institutions in Victoria. Manny, the brother of Peter, who is the general manager and assistant trainer, told Neos Kosmos that part of the attraction of the sport was to find the right horse.
“The horses we have had are Group 1 horses that are at the pinnacle of horseracing,” he said. In 2011, a PGR horse, Levendi won the 2018 Australian Derby at the Royal Randwick during the Sydney Autumn Racing Carnival,” said Manny Gelagotis.
A PGR horse will be running at Flemington on Tuesday although it will not feature in the main event but for purist like Manny Gelagotis while the Melbourne Cup is about glamour and tradition, the better race is the Cox Plate (held last Saturday).
“The Cox Plate is about the faster horses. The Melbourne Cup is about stayers (horses with stamina),” he said. Many international horses particularly from the UK were bred for stamina, Australian horses tended to be bred for their sprinting.
He said that while the COVID-19 measures had been difficult for owners and trainers it had not otherwise affected horseracing.
“In some ways not having crowds at the racing is better because the horses are a lot calmer,” he said.
For Mr Tzaferis and many others, the biggest Greek name in Australian racing history has got to be Nick Moriatis. His horse, Might and Power, matched the achievements of the legendary Phar Lap to win the Caulfield Cup, the Melbourne Cup, both in 1997, and the Cox Plate the following year.
Might and Power was named Australian Horse of the Year in 1998 and 1999.
Another Greek great in Australian horseracing, said Mr Tzaferis, was he Toowoomba-born jockey Stathi Katsidis who blazed a name in horseracing from an early age to be considered as one of the best jockeys of his generation.
His untimely death on 19 October, came just before he was to ride in the Caulfield Cup and the Melbourne Cup races of 2010.