THE HEAD LASS
On lst August 2008, 28year old Charlie was given the job of Head Lass at Wynbury. She is no stranger to taking on a position of responsibility in a yard having been Head Lass for Jimmy Moffat at Cartmel until she joined the Wynbury team last season as 2nd travelling head person.
Charlie was at Moffat’s yard from March 1999 to January 2007. It was a dual purpose yard. During his time as a trainer Dudley Moffat won the Yorkshire Cup. When Charlie started at Cartmel there were 9 horses. By the time Dudley’s son Jimmy took over in 2003, there were 32 horses. Jimmy had 150 winners as a jockey and continued in his father’s footsteps of producing winners.
Jimmy left the running of the yard to Charlie where she did a wide range of tasks from looking after four horses to overseeing staff, communicating with owners; to taking horses racing. A good grounding for future work in a larger yard.
Charlie was quite candid about her reasons for becoming involved with horses. Charlie’s parents, concerned at what was happening in their neighbourhood, actively encouraged her to become involved with horses and the local horsey crowd to keep her out of trouble, despite them not having any experience of riding or working with horses. Their support paid off as Charlie began working with a trotting horse called Hitman! She describes learning to ride the “hard way” on him having falls that made one keen to stay on. As things progressed whilst Charlie did not drive him in races she trained him to come second in 3 races in a row. He was sold when she went to Newmarket Racing College, as she did not know where she would find work.
Charlie went to the Racing College on leaving school at 16. It was make or break time in that it was a way of her finding out whether she could commit herself to a career in racing. She loved it and went directly to a job at Martin Pipe’s yard. For a young person who is the oldest of 8 children from a close family she found the distance from home hard to adjust to at the start. However, she stayed for 18 months and learned a great deal in a yard that had and has such a proven success rate.
Throughout her career in racing Charlie has developed skills that ably support her work as Head Lass at Wynbury. Above all else the job comes first and whilst her partner of 7 years, Matt, (who was a fitness instructor), works at Wynbury work and home are kept entirely separate. She sees the secret of working with staff as leading by example, being consistent, and building on, in particular with young people, their strengths as it builds their confidence and encourages them to tackle more difficult tasks in the future and pursuing further training. Charlie has completed her NVQ Level 1 to 3 and is waiting to start NVQ Level 4. In addition she has completed a racing secretarial course and a computer skills course. Finally she identified loyalty to the boss and the yard as crucial to undertaking any job in a yard. If that respect is not there her view is that one should not be in the job.
This commitment has been taken up as Ferdy has given her a chance to learn more by training a point to pointer, Novelle Marie, this season with her partner, Matt race riding. No mean undertaking as it will involve additional hours and the majority of the limited spare time they both have away from work. There is a sense that should the chance arise she would be happy to sleep in the stables and the horses and the job are so important to her. Even when asked what she would do if she won the lottery she was certain that she would turn in for work!
The NVQ Level 4 will take her much deeper into the veterinary side of the care of horses, which is her particular interest and will be a means of broadening her knowledge. She continues to build up a library of horse books and has an active interest in chiropractice work with horses. Charlie feels that by the time she is 35 she would have a sound knowledge base upon which to start training. If her past in an indicator of her absorption in the world of racing and relishing hard work it is very likely that she will achieve this goal. In the meantime she gives 100% to Wynbury.