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NO ONE COULD have blamed Peter Gordon Moody for making a quick and clean break from the industry that had brought him such joy, and then meted out such pain. Whether he deserved it or not, his work ethic through what must have felt like the longest year of his life could hardly have been faulted.

He had long insisted he was not a ‘lifer’, but his leaving was far from the strategically planned exit that he had imagined, and probably even mapped out with wife and business partner Sarah. And the manner of it rankled. So, true to form, this irrepressible character refused to fade away, or lie down, or even take a real holiday. He went in a completely different direction: he hired a corporate manager and started building a career at the edge of the track. He could not train for the six-month suspension period, of course, but he could stay close to his life’s grand passion.

Moody became a popular public speaker, and not just after dinner, appearing as a special guest at racing carnivals like Warrnambool’s annual four-day festival, and the Darwin Cup. He signed on to do an autobiography for a reported ‘six-figure’ sum, and became an ambassador for Ladbrokes, one of the world’s biggest online bookmakers.

There was much speculation in racing circles about why he was taking on all this work. Could he not afford to pass up such offers? He had made no secret about wanting to ‘keep the wolf from the door’, and claimed to have spent a good $500,000 on legal fees through the cobalt case. But did he really need so much money so quickly that he had to take on all these projects? And if he was going to train again, as most genuinely hoped he would, would not a role with a multinational betting shop compromise the perception of his independence, should he return to the training ranks?

Moody had barely had six weeks off when the online bookmaker released details of its star catch on 29 April 2016, and he had continued his bloodstock work during that period. But even those few weeks of sleeping in must have felt like months of downtime to a man who, for most of his life, was always up long before even the hint of dawn.

‘As I’ve said all along, I need a job just like everyone else, and what Ladbrokes has in the pipeline moving forward is very exciting,’ Peter Moody was quoted as saying in the media statement the leviathan bookie released announcing his appointment. ‘It’s actually been quite a refreshing month or so, taking that step back. But I obviously still want to be involved in the racing industry and Ladbrokes was a really good fit.’

The woman who knows Moody best sees just blue sky ahead, and a positive path. ‘What’s happened is mind-blowing, really,’ says Sarah Moody. ‘But we’re going to make the best of it, and I think it’s a blessing in disguise.’ She is sitting in their kitchen, looking out over the rolling paddocks of their Belgrave farm, home to her four showjumpers and 10 other horses spelling at the property.

‘Some of those are ours, or ones that we have shares in,’ she observes. ‘Obviously, moving forward we would like to not own many, because they cost us a fortune. We would have shares still in 70 or 80 that we need to move on, because we can’t afford [them] without a business. Ideally, we would have maybe a handful that we may race; I hope not to race any, but obviously we can’t just get rid of them all straight away.’

She is adamant the Victorian stewards have been ‘hounding’ their operation for years. ‘We would be one of the most tested stables in the country and have they ever found anything? I said to the stewards a while back, “If it’s about the integrity of racing, then why don’t you make it known all the stables you test and find nothing? How many horses you test [in] a month and find nothing?” They said, “Oh, well, nobody wants to know about that, that’s not of any interest to anybody.”’

Sarah claims that, about four years ago, stewards tested every horse at Moody Racing’s yard at Caulfield. ‘Apparently, someone tipped them off that Pete … had to be using something, because he was so successful. Nothing came of it. Nothing came of it, nothing was said about it.’ She says this inspection was on top of regular random tests every three or four months. ‘They would just come in and randomly test whatever horses they wanted, and found nothing. We would be stupid to think that we could give a horse something and get away with it, when you know that they’re coming and testing you all the time.’

She predicts her husband will continue to work with his small band of broodmares. Conscious of the expectation that surrounds his professional future, she is adamant about what else he will and will not do in the times ahead.

‘He will never leave the industry, but he will never train again,’ she insists. ‘They say, “He’ll be back – of course he’ll be back.” My answer to that is, by coming back and training again, that is saying what they have done to us is okay, and it is not okay. I speak about Pete training as “we” because it is us. It is our business – it is our life. So we will never train again. [But] Pete will definitely be involved in the industry, for sure.’

The trainer himself is not quite as specific about what the future does or doesn’t hold, at least publicly. But it is not too hard to read between the lines. He expects testing procedures for all illegal substances to be significantly reviewed in light of developments in Victoria’s on-going cobalt cases, and is typically blunt about the current state of his relationship with racing authorities.

‘These are people I’ve got to look to every race day, and respect. They’ve got a key to my house, and my office, and my stables. I can’t make a mistake, [or else] I’m a cheat … and these blokes have control over my destiny. Would I want to return to that? To bow and scrape to these men, who I’m ultimately supposed to show respect to, and I want to show respect to – but I can’t show them respect that they probably deserve, [because] of what I know.’

With uncharacteristic restraint, Moody alludes to possible legal ramifications, should trainers Mark Kavanagh and Danny O’Brien successfully appeal their disqualifications. ‘I think it’ll play out a fair bit more,’ he says. ‘The science has got to be studied a bit more, [and] their testing procedures probably need to be tidied up. I know there’ll be quite a deal of stuff presented in the other cases – which ultimately might not change the outcome of their destiny.

‘But it’ll show that Racing Victoria, for some unknown reason … had it in their head that [cobalt] was unbelievable, [and] being used in the industry. But I don’t know – I know I wasn’t using it. I think Racing Victoria know, through the levels that they took, [that] maybe trainers were using it or trying to use it. Maybe they thought there was a big issue there. Maybe they were trying to catch other stables too.’

*

Not long after the Easter Yearling Sale, the trainer was again on the move, making a 14-hour drive up the highway to Queensland in late autumn. The trip perhaps revealed more of his soul than he probably intended. ‘I was in Melbourne on Thursday and around 1 p.m. I said to the old woman, “I’m going for a drive for a week, or 10 days, or a fortnight.”’ He wanted to catch up with old friends up north, and Toowoomba’s annual Weetwood race meeting seemed a good place to start.

After driving through the night, the trainer eventually arrived at Basil Nolan’s Raheen Stud, just outside Warwick on the Darling Downs. ‘I got to the stud at 3 a.m. and thought, “I can’t wake any bastard up.”’ So he rolled out his swag near his car and fell asleep, only to be woken a little later – by an unexpected visitor. ‘At 5.30 a.m. I could sense something was licking my ear. They have a pet black-and-white lamb and the bloody thing took a liking to me. I hunted it away, then at 6.30 I heard this, “Oi, oi!” Basil Nolan was standing 10 foot away from my swag, but was not game to come and poke me; he didn’t know who it was, because I [had] pulled the flaps up. The Nolans shit themselves when they found me asleep on the front lawn!’

Later that day, he went to the races, ‘where there was a gathering of folk from western Queensland for one of my mates’ daughter’s 20th birthday. There was a heap of Charleville people there, so we sat up the back on the grass at Toowoomba and drank 48 cans. By the time we got in front of the grandstand, the lights were on but every bastard had gone home. It was the first time I have paid to go to a race meeting in my bloody life – $25, if you don’t mind – and I did not see a horse.’

It was vintage Peter Moody. A ramshackle moment in a rollicking, roller-coaster ride of a life, and quite out of sync with the rigid schedule he has held to for some three decades as he shaped horses to be fast and brave. Finally, the trainer was relaxing, letting his guard down in a space in which he felt safe. Back where he came from, under the big sky of Wyandra, and Charleville. And horses not quite in sight, but always within cooee.