VALE JACK STYRING oam
BY PATRICK BARTLEY
Victorian racing lost a legend of the sport in early February with the passing of beloved race caller and media personality, Jack Styring OAM. For many Victorian racing fans, Jack Styring’s voice was a familiar one, his famous calls adding to the excitement of a race. Victorians have long flocked to Hanging Rock for the Australia Day and NewYear’s Day race meetings. The appeal was not only for quality racing. No, it was the dulcet tones of Jack Styring and his colourful calls that had attendances at the tiny rural track swell. Phrases describing a horse, “racing with its mouth open like a cod fish calling to its young” and a free-wheeling thoroughbred reefing for rein as, “baring its molars to the breeze” are part of his vernacular. Only stepping away from the field glasses at the age of 82, Styring’s first venture into race broadcasting was at Essendon’s Napier Park greyhounds in 1947. He turned his hand to gallops in 1950, at Kaniva, South Australian. Following his passing aged 92, just shy of his 93rd birthday, Styring left a legacy in the racing world with his calls. But it wasn’t only this that tied him to the sport. Styring lived and breathed racing, and was involved in almost every facet. He mentored journalists, callers, even aspiring stud masters. He bred a horse named She’s A Doll. He wrote columns on breeding in the Sporting Globe and theWeekly Times. He also sold advertising space in the two mastheads. “I think I’ve donemost things in racing and I’ve enjoyed everymoment of it ... this industry has given me so much for so long,” he once said. Styring was recognised for his talent and hard work by receiving many awards, but he was also acknowledged of his lifetime spent dedicated to country racing when the Country Racing Victoria Media Award was renamed the Jack Styring Media Award. The award is
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