Former Richmond legend, Bill Barrot, is back training horses again and will feature in this year’s breakfast panel in the lead-up to the Cranbourne Cup.
By Justin Robertson
THE Cranbourne Turf Club is gearing up for the Cranbourne Cup with a breakfast panel featuring former football greats.
Ex-Richmond coach Terry Wallace will host the breakfast with a panel of Richmond champions and arguably the best centre line in VFL- AFL history with Francis Bourke, Billy Barrot and Dick Clay in the lead-up to the cup on Sunday 10 October.
Pearcedale’s Bill Barrot said the morning will be packed with football stories and will give pundits one last look at the field before the cup.
“It’s going to be great build up before the cup,” he said. “We’ll tell a few stories and you’ll get to see some of the horses racing on the Saturday.”
Barrot spent 10 years at Richmond, kicked 91 goals for them, played 120 games and also claimed the club’s best and fairest in 1965, was named in the team of the century and was involved in two premierships.
“Playing football is like training racehorses – people only see the tip of the iceberg, the two thirds underneath is the work, the training, disappointments, injury, same with horses and footballers,” Barrot said. “All sport is tough, it’s not easy.”
When Barrot arrived at Richmond, the club hadn’t won a flag for 24 years and while he enjoyed success on and off the field he conceded he pushed himself too hard to really enjoy his time as a league footballer.
“I remember I used to pump the weights, and just trained and trained,” he said. “I trained 11 months of the year, it didn’t matter if we were training or running for football, I was at the gym with Tom Hafey pumping the weights all the time.”
It was when Barrot was 25 that his love for horses grew when in 1972, while playing football at Oakleigh, the then club president Dean Lester – his father – sold him his first mare.
After receiving five concussions in six games the Richmond midfielder called it quits on football and started breeding horses after getting his trainer’s licence in 1977.
“I won my first race at Traralgon with my first runner, a horse called ‘A Fire’,” the Cranbourne trainer said. “That was pretty exciting.”
Up until 1997, Barrot won several races as a trainer – at Traralgon, Ballarat, Stony Creek and Bairnsdale – and after a 12-year absence has just renewed his trainer’s licence and has been back for the past six months.
“It’s still a hobby at the moment and I only just have the one horse – a four-year-old mare, Milo – but training horses is just as hard as football, you’ve got to be just as dedicated,” Barrot said. “I’m not a young bloke any more, so for now, I’ll probably leave it be at the moment and see how life turns around.”
