KEY POINTS:
Rugby, racing and beer is too cliched to consider mentioning these days. Except if you're Barry Brown.
As the part owner of remarkable galloper Sir Slick, favourite for today's $200,000 Starcraft Stakes at Ellerslie, Brown heartily embraces the three traditional Kiwi icons.
But he tacks the word friends on the back of it.
Brown, a lifetime dairy farmer these days near Ngatea, has picked up half the $676,160 Sir Slick has won so far - most of it this season - but sees that as far less significant than the friends he's made in horse racing.
The former Thames Valley representative halfback says the Sir Slick money simply funds his overall involvement in the racing game.
And that in turn has brought him friendships he values higher than mere money.
He describes the people he races horses in partnerships with and owners of other horses prepared by Sir Slick's trainer Graeme Nicholson at Te Aroha as: "The community with Graeme."
"I took a one-tenth share in a horse with Graeme last year and when I met the other shareholders one of them was a guy that had been adopted by my godmother as a child.
"I hadn't seen him for 55 years and here I was suddenly racing a horse with him.
"I couldn't believe it when I met him at a syndicate barbecue, I just stood there staring at him.
"That's what horse racing can do, it brings people together."
Brown always had an interest in horses and was originally talked into owning one by former Auckland rugby halfback Rodney Doidge.
"I've had shares in plenty of horses since those days."
Dairy farming, he says, is not a great cash cow, it simply builds assets through the herd and the land.
"I bought my herd in 1965.
"With the land and the cows it's like buying a house in Auckland 40 years ago for $45,000 and having it valued now at a million dollars.
"The horse can earn a hell of a lot more than I can."
Brown turned 60 about the time be bought half of Sir Slick and felt he was at life's crossroads.
"I had a bit of an insurance payout that had matured and felt I could afford a few more shares in horses.
"I was prepared to keep working, but I wasn't prepared to keep saving.
"I told the kids I was racing on their money from now on."
The sensational form of Sir Slick - remarkably he's shooting for four straight group one wins today - has meant that actually hasn't happened.
Nicholson says Sir Slick has trained on magnificently since winning the Otaki Maori WFA last start.
Brown keeps insisting he's in racing for the fun side, but today his topliner is shooting for a winning stake of $120,000.
Half of that equates to a lot of friendship. And fun.
Brown says if the horse wins he'll probably have a celebratory whisky.
Even that mirrors his life the same as rugby, racing and beer.
"I lived on Waiheke Island until I was 10 and my dad used to straighten out problem racehorses working them on the beach.
"The one he assigned to me was called Black Label."
