During a racing day, track announcers also inform patrons of scratches, and jockey/driver and equipment changes (for example, whether a horse is wearing "quarter inch bends" or "mud caulks").
"[3] As radio audiences surged in the pre-World War II years, more stations employed race callers.
The leading callers of the era included Jim Anderson at 4BC Brisbane, who had started his career on the course public address system; Eric Welsh, the doyen of Australian race callers, who commenced with 3AR, Melbourne, in 1926, which became the ABC in 1932, until joining 3DB in 1934, where he remained for the next 20 years; Lachie Melville in Sydney; and Fred Tupper in Sydney and Melbourne.
Starting as an assistant in Hobart in 1946, Joe Brown won the premier caller role for the ABC in Melbourne in 1947, following the retirement of Jim Carroll.
[4] Brown called Rimfire's win in his first broadcast of Australia's most famous race, the 2 mile (now 3,200 metres) handicap, the Melbourne Cup, in 1948.
His call of Think Big's win in the 1974 Melbourne Cup was an example of the colourful style that attracted many listeners.1974 Melbourne Cup- Think Big - YouTube Known as 'the accurate one', Bill Collins started his race calling career when the regular course commentator failed to arrive at the Lindenow races in East Gippsland in 1943.
His famous calls included the WS Cox Plate when Kingston Town won for a third time in 1982,Kingston Town 1982 Cox Plate Full Replay - YouTube and the great duel between the New Zealand thoroughbreds, Bonecrusher and Our Waverley Star, in 1986.1986 Cox Plate (Bonecrusher vs Our Waverley Star) - YouTube Collins was a talented commentator, regarded by many as the best in the nation when Australian callers were the best in the world, also calling both Harness Racing and the Olympic Games.
Many of the leading Sydney race callers were nurtured in their careers by Clif Cary, the prominent sports editor of the era.
Other leading callers of the era included Bert Day and John O'Neil in Adelaide and Vince Curry in Brisbane .
Although most callers worked for radio and television stations, a few were chiefly the course broadcaster, notable amongst them, Frank O'Brien at the Flemington and Moonee Valley racecourses in Melbourne.
In Melbourne, they included John Russell, Bryan Martin, Bruce McAvaney, Clem Dimsey and Greg Miles.
His memorable calls include Fields of Omagh, a horse he co-owned, twice winning Australia's premier Weight-for-Age race, the WS Cox Plate at Moonee Valley; and Better Loosen Up's victory in the 1990 Japan Cup.
Bruce McAvaney commenced his celebrated sports commentary career as a race caller with Radio 5DN, Adelaide, in 1976 before joining Television station ADS-7.
[11] Although the chief thoroughbred caller in Sydney, one of his best known calls was Mt Eden's victory in the 1971 Miracle Mile at Harold Park Paceway.
A young Darren McAullay commenced a long career as the chief caller at 6PR Perth in 1980 after broadcasting in rural Western Australia.
In Brisbane, Wayne Wilson who was an understudy to Vince Curry at 4BC calling harness racing, became the chief thoroughbred caller in 1983, a position he held until 2010.
Matt Hill, the chief caller in Melbourne with Racing.com since 2017, began in radio as a technical assistant to Greg Miles and Bryan Martin at 3UZ.
Davis spent 14 years in Hong Kong, replacing Darren Flindell as the chief English language caller in 2015.
He joined the BBC in 1993, succeeding Sir Peter O'Sullevan as the chief caller in 1997, a position he retained until the broadcast rights were transferred to Channel 4 in 2012.
In 1989, Geller became the English language caller in Hong Kong where he worked for six and a half years before moving to Emerald Downs in Washington State in 1996.
More recently, Dan Mielicki, has been the chief harness racing caller in Melbourne, Fred Hastings in Sydney and Chris Barsby in Brsibane.
Others who specialised in greyhound racing include Paul Ambrosoli in Sydney[15] and the father and son team, Maurie and Wayne Kirby in Melbourne.
[17] Alby Gain was the caller at Alexandra Park harness racing in Auckland for 27 years, after replacing Reg Clapp in 1983.
Former South African caller, Trevor Denman, became internationally known as the voice of Santa Anita Park in Arcadia, California, from 1983 to 2016.
Other South African callers of note include Alistair Cohen at Johannesburg, Johan Malherbe at Cape Town, and Craig and Sheldon Peters at Durban.
[25] As an aside, Jack Adler and Fred Burns were friends, worked in boxing together and even announced baseball as a tandem for the New York Giants.
He later gained national fame calling important horse races for the NBC Radio Network, including the Kentucky Derby, starting in 1929.
The best-known horse-race callers since the dawn of the television age have been Chic Anderson, Dave Johnson, Trevor Denman and Tom Durkin.
[28] All four gained acclaim not only as public-address announcers but network sportscasters, providing pre-race analyses and features for national fans as well as the race calls.
Harness racing fixtures past & present are Ken Middleton, Shannon 'Sugar' Doyle, Larry Lederman, Roger Huston, Jack E. Lee, Sam McKee & Ken Warkentin In New England, at Suffolk Downs in East Boston, Massachusetts, and Rockingham Park in Salem, New Hampshire, an announcer, Babe Rubenstein, called races for decades, starting in the 1930s.