BEER'S BERLIN

WRITTEN BY STEVE MORAN

One town, Albury-Wodonga, divided.

“I’ve cried but only in the shower…and that doesn’t count, does it?” said Mitch Beer as he reflected on the trials of a border-straddling trainer over the past two years.

From the bushfires of late 2019 to the emerging pandemic in early 2020 it has been a testing time for the young horseman.

Brent Crawford, Beer’s Administration manager, says it’s been akin to living astride the Berlin Wall.

“One town, Albury-Wodonga, divided. It’s like we were split by the Berlin wall. Staff on both sides. The rules constantly changing between New South Wales and Victoria. It was extremely difficult for everyone, especially Mitch who’s handled it so well all things considered,” Crawford said.

Most of us have empathised, from afar, with any border business operators whose commercial and personal lives have been even more complicated than the majority of the nation’s population.

In Beer’s case, the complications extended beyond staff to the management of 50 odd horses many of which he lost when it became impossible to relocate them from Victorian farms or nearly impossible to run them on tracks south of the Murray.

His duo annus horribilis began with a moratorium on running his horses anywhere as they were adversely affected by a bushfire-smoke engulfed Albury; extended to relocating horses from bushfire affected areas to eventually having to acquaint himself with Covid-19 rules and regulations on almost a daily basis.

“I’d make an instant coffee at home, drive to Mugachino in Albury to get a “real one” and while I waited for them to open at 5 (am), I’d be checking for any updates on the Covid rules and regulations and checking the bank balance which was usually depressing.

“The hardest part was the feeling that I was managing this on my own. Not that I didn’t have great support from people like Brent, many of my owners and the staff but the whole time you’re thinking you can’t let the staff know how grim things are looking,” Beer said.

BC - before Covid - life had been looking grand for Beer. The winners had flowed freely in the 18 months since his move to Albury from Mornington where he says he’d been miserable.

Mitch Beer

That’s no longer his mood nor disposition despite the misery which has followed AD - after division of state borders.

And not a state of mind you’d associate with the trainer who’s built a strong social media following with his often amusing or irreverent posts. Chris Waller may have ten times as many horses but only twice the number of Twitter followers.

The restrictions on movement, of course, became the biggest nightmare for those dwelling on one side of the Murray River but working on the other. This was especially so for Beer and his fellow Albury trainers.

It wasn’t just employees disadvantaged but also contractors including veterinarians and farriers. And then horses, after a second wave of Covid-19, in Victoria in 2020, prompted Racing NSW to ban the transportation of horses into NSW.

All the while, the Beer’s bank balance was diminishing and - all the while - he had to respond on the fly, as the communication of bans imposed was almost non-existent from the governing body.

Beer’s Victorian-based staff relocated in a matter of hours. More than 20 horses could not. They had to be transferred to other trainers. Another financial drain ensued.

“When the border closed mid-way through last year, we had very little notice to move some key staff in to Albury. We were very lucky to find a suitable AirBNB. At one stage, it looked like the caravan park might be our only option.

“These people willingly moved away from family and partners for three or four months. They were and are amazing but it was another financial burden for Mitch,” said Crawford who continues to provide administrative services for Beer, and many other industry participants, under the banner of Elite Racing Solutions.

Beer recalls that three cabins at the local caravan park did, indeed, house his staff on night one of the lockdown.

“The police and government authorities had booked out the hotels,” he said - as if they were doing their best to exacerbate local frustration.

“It was a crazy time. We’re trying to run with four sets of rules - from two state governments and two racing bodies.

LOOK, AND IT’S NOT JUST BEEN US, BUT ALL THE TRAINERS HERE IN ALBURY. IT’S AMAZING HOW THE STAFF FROM VARIOUS STABLES HAVE HELPED EACH OTHER OUT.

“We’d all joke we were living “the Unstable Life”, a mockumentary of Big Brother. We had eight young staff members living in the one house. The TV networks might have paid big bucks for it,” Beer said.

Beer says there was little assistance from any quarter and massive frustration as the ban did not apply to all horses.

“I think there were 18,500 positive COVID-19 cases in Victoria and not one of them was traced back to the transportation of a thoroughbred racehorse,” he said at the time. “That’s a statistic that got lost somewhere in the system.”

At the time of writing, complications remained in terms of visiting family and racing horses south of the Murray but Beer says the whole experience has had its positives.

“Rather bizarrely, I feel re-energised. Covid-19 has been the first real business hurdle I’ve had to overcome. It was out of my hands.

“I’m not a “woe is me” person and the losses we’ve endured will average themselves out over the next few years. We’re in a much better place now compared to where we were 12 months ago,” he said on the eve of Victoria’s stringent late 2021 lockdown easing.

He’s built a strong ownership base and is looking forward to 2022 and beyond.

“We’ve gone through a lot of rigmarole and it’s incredible what becomes normal. But we had to deal with it, as hard as it was, when we had half our horses on either side of the border and you could just about throw a rock from one to the other but you couldn’t transport them.

“Look, and it’s not just been us, but all the trainers here in Albury. It’s amazing how the staff from various stables have helped each other out.

“I’m not sure you’d say it’s been a roller-coaster because there hasn’t been many ups and I’m not going to say it’s been character building but it has made me realise how much I want do this because there’s been plenty of days when it would have been easier to just say “bugger it,” Beer said.

Beer has a plan. He has no desire to compete with the leviathan stables in terms of numbers but certainly wants be, on occasions, competing against them.

His success in Sydney’s Highway races has underlined his ability to find the right horse for the right race.

“We’re building a clientele to buy better horses and who doesn’t want to buy a nice, well bred yearling but there’s nothing wrong with the tried horse we can identify to win a Highway or even aim at the Kosciusko. Win a Highway and there’ll be three new horses in the stable,” he said.

Sunrise Ruby was something of stable standardbearer this year, winning three on end including a $100,000 Highway at Randwick and took her place as a well fancied Kosciusko runner but was repeatedly blocked for a clear run in the straight in that grand final.

Susan Langdon, the mare’s breeder and part-owner, has been one of many who has offered the stable significant support.

“I met Susan when I was working with Jason Warren and we bought Sunrise Ruby’s half sister Esprit Joy who ran second at Sandown, to Tawteen, at her second start but was then bitten by a snake and died.

“Susan was a client who’s become a good friend despite the fact I ring her with bad news 90 per cent of the time. She gave me two horses to train even before I had my licence. Paid my electricity bill when I started out. She’s a lawyer who helped me through the Covid saga. I might have finished up in jail otherwise,” he said.

Beer’s Echuca Cup success with Hanger, who was raced in New Zealand by Cambridge and Waikato Studs, has broadened his ownership base.

“I’m always on the phone to the New Zealand breeders. They probably think “who’s this annoying kid from Albury” but I persevere.

“We’ve got a Savabeel gelding out of a half sister to Queensland Derby winner Brambles for Waikato and a nice filly from Trelawney who are both unraced and showing some promise.

“I think, I hope, that they respect what we’ve done in a relatively short time; that we’re new and keen and having a go,” he said.

The support of Victorian owners and breeders Steve and Sally Watkins has also been significant. Steve Watkins famously trained 250/1 chance Abaridy to win the 1986 Caulfield Guineas.

“Steve’s been a great supporter of the stable and stuck despite the fact that we had a lot more bad luck than good at the start. It’s humbling really to get some very nice horses from a man who’s a Group 1 winning trainer himself. I met him through Sally as we spell horses at her Willaroon Park property which is about an hour from us,” he said.

Beer certainly has no regrets about his move from Mornington and believes that “out of town” trainers are better placed now than they’ve ever been.

“Maybe 15 to 20 years ago, you couldn’t have hoped to get nice horses to train if you weren’t at Flemington or Caulfield or Randwick but that’s changed plus the facilities here (Albury) are great and it’s less frantic. Albury’s a fantastic place to live,” he said.

Lockdowns and the on-line experience have also altered the complexion of racing according to Beer. “You can now deliver an excellent product, training a racehorse from just about anywhere. There’s plenty of cheque books between Sydney and Melbourne.

“These days you get fantastic coverage of even the lesser meetings and people have become more connected via the TV coverage.

“Clients certainly want to be kept in touch via emails and videos and we’ve taken that to another level through the pandemic and I believe the demographic of people using social media has also changed through Covid. People, of all ages, are getting their news and Covid updates via social media,” he said.

Beer says that he has worked to develop a sense of inclusion and connection so that all clients take some delight in seeing the success of others.

“Twitter’s definitely worked for us because we haven’t tried to use it as a marketing tool. It’s just been fun and people have engaged with that,” he said.

Despite the tribulations of the past two years, Beer is focused on what’s ahead.

“I WAS LOOKING DOWN THE BARN THE OTHER DAY AND THINKING I COULD HAPPILY DO THIS FOR THE REST OF MY LIFE. GOOD OWNERS, GOOD STAFF AND OUR STOCK HAS GOT BETTER AND BETTER IN THE THREE YEARS SINCE WE SET UP IN ALBURY,” HE SAID.