They say getting knocked down in life is a given, it’s getting back up that is a choice.
Group 1-winning trainer Robbie Laing has dusted himself off once or twice before throughout his turbulent career, but he was dealt another cruel blow last week when his stable stalwart Stars of Carrum died in a routine trackwork session.
You couldn’t blame the affable Laing for letting it get him down, but this is a man with tunnel-like vision to get back to the top.
Ruled out of the sport for two years with his licence striped due to bankruptcy, wealthy backers convinced RV to give him a lifeline two years ago and he was reinstated.
It’s been no golden ticket, however, for a man who has won over 1100 races – a long way from the glory days of an Australian Cup upset with Roman Arch and Victoria Derby romp with Polanski.
“A couple of mornings I took horses over and couldn’t get them worked,” Laing said of his comeback.
“I was getting over there with two horses … I’d have to swim them and treadmill them because I’d been waiting three hours for a jockey.
“Dad (Eddie) would say, ‘what, you didn’t get them worked? Give the game away’ … but what else was I going to do?
“It didn’t get me down at all, I was just happy to be back doing what I love.
“I never got pissed off.”
Laing likens his rebuild the past few years to that of a footy team, “bugger the canteen and the goal posts … to get members back you need players”.
With restrictions attached to his licence on buying horses for the major yearling merchants, it was a plan that had its flaws.
Laing had to get creative about getting horses in the door, which currently sits at 20 horses in training on-course at Cranbourne.
Most have been passed-in lots he’s negotiated with breeders, with mogul Gerry Harvey being one of his biggest supporters with progeny by Snitzel, Brazen Beau, Capitalist now under his care.
But it’s a leaf out of a legendary trainer’s book, quite literally, that is motivating Laing’s latest revival.
“I’ve never been a smoker and I’ve never been a drinker, so my big blemish has been buying horses,” Laing admits.
“Part of me says be boutique, the other part of me says I’d love to have 40 horses like I used to.
“When I first got my licence back, the sales were coming up, I must’ve had an opinion of myself and I thought people will say, ‘Robbie’s back let’s give him an order to buy a horse’ and it just didn’t happen.
“I read the book on Bart Cummings, he goes into bankruptcy when he was 63 and comes back at my age and won another four Melbourne Cups.
“Bart had the right attitude, always relaxed, never altered and didn’t change his training regime, so I thought if I keep feeding them the same and keep turning up?
“I think I am training as good now as I ever have, I just need some nice horses.”
Never one to follow the pack, Laing’s certainly not planning on changing his tried-and-true training techniques anytime soon.
“I work them over ground and some of the trackwork riders … I’m old school and some of them wonder what’s going on … it’s strange work, I guess, to the younger trainers,” he admits.
“So now I just have to train my staff!”
Previously a notable player in the jumps racing circuit, Laing who famously won the Grand Annual with Sir Pentire first-up after two years sidelined, said he was itching to get back involved with the right support having not saddled a jumps starter in four and a half years.
So, for a man who has dealt with many a twist and turn, what’s the crystal ball saying for Robbie Laing?
“A mate of mine the other day from school asked, ‘how are you travelling?’ And I said, ‘a bit shabby at the moment but in two years, mark my words, I’ll be a millionaire and own a farm’.
“I’m just one horse off doing that!”
And just like Bart Cummings, that would be a book worth reading.