BROWNIE'S BLOG: IT TOOK A LOT OF EFFORT BUT THE REWARD MADE IT ALL WORTHWHILE

By Damian Browne | Friday, August 18, 2017

It might just have been a regular race-day but Oink's win at Doomben last Saturday provided Damian Browne with a high level of personal satisfaction given the fact that he had elected to step outside of his normal comfort zone to take the ride in what could be called 'special circumstances.' In this edition of Brownie's Blog, which appears exclusively on HRO, the gun rider tells the story of a special win.

Some wins really just give you personal satisfaction more than anything else and certainly my win on Oink last Saturday at Doomben falls into that category.

I guess it has been well documented how I got my weight down to ride at 54.5kg and why I chose to take the ride at a weight I would normally only consider for big feature races.

Paul Hammersley is Oink’s regular rider but he has been out with injury. I did ride Oink in its previous start and he ran super (when we finished second to Prioritise) so when they said he was going into that race I was interested.

First off, I sort of said no. Then I had a think about it and thought, oh well, this is one I probably should do because of my respect for Tim Bell and his family who have strong connections to the horse. Oink was also in the right race ... a race he clearly could win.

Getting down in weight was a fairly tough process. I kept a tight hold on what I was eating and drinking. Apart from one cup of coffee in the morning I really only drank water all day ... and I tried to stay active as much as possible not only with my gym sessions but with everything else as well.

I do go to the gym fairly regularly anyway but I did do a little bit more in the gym in the week leading up to the race.

Generally I would try to be a little easy on my level of activity because of my legs but I did really get into it for those ten days or so.

I can tell you I certainly won’t be doing that every week.

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I have to admit that there were a couple of times during that week when I thought, what the hell am I doing here, but the reasons I was doing it for always resurfaced at the right time and that gave me the motivation to carry on.

Motivation is a big thing when you are taking on something that is not easy to do. If motivation is lacking obviously it is a lot more difficult but I had good reason for doing what I was doing and therefore had the solid motivation to see it through.

The horse, in its own way, brings us together around Tim (Bell). Tim’s parents are involved with the horse as is Tim’s girlfriend and her family. The horse’s silks with the red and the purple bell ... there is a lot more feeling involved here than normal.

Tim is sadly missed.

Although I don’t claim to have been as close to him as some people like Paul (Hammersley) and Luke (Dittman) and others, he is somebody I had a respect for and, more than that, he was just such a good friend both on and off the track ... so I was very happy to be able to be part of win which, in some small way, honoured his memory.

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The diet regime I had gone through did take its toll straight after the win.

Adrenaline takes you a long way. That is why jockeys who waste hard can ride a superb race. It is not until you get off the horse and the heart rate starts to slow that you can start to feel a bit dizzy and certain effects start to take place.

Adrenaline overrides that but once I got off the horse on Saturday I started to feel the effects quite quickly and I was stood down for the remainder of the meeting.

I then just spent my time rehydrating. I couldn’t eat much that night. I had a few bottles of water to rehydrate.

I felt like I had a severe hangover the next day without having had a drink ... but I got over that in time to ride again on Sunday.

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Oink was a special circumstance but I’ve also got to be happy about the way I’ve kicked off the season.

Normally, in the last five or six years, I have had most of August off. In those years when I did not ride in August, it just took me so long to get back to where I wanted to be, so I thought I’m going to go through this year and not have a break.

I’ll have a couple of weekends off here and there with the wife and kids ... like over Christmas ... but I decided that I was not going to have a two or three week holiday now like I usually do.

By doing that obviously my weight has been a little bit better than normal at this time of the year and, importantly, I feel good.

I thought, if I am going to miss out on a holiday I’d better get the most out of my riding and, like I say, I’m very happy with the way I am riding and with the way I have kick-started my season result-wise.

I was happy enough but not ecstatic with my results last season. I thought they could have been a little bit better ... so one of my aims is to improve on last season in general while also targeting a few specific goals.

Like at home where Jeff (Lloyd) took the Sunshine Coast Jockey’s Premiership title off me last season.

He’s not catching me this year!

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