OFF THE RECORD #6

Quietly Departed: Remembering Tony Furness

Horseracing, more than a sport, is a tradition—an elaborate dance between history and the present in which it is important that we, the guardians of tradition, pay homage to members of this unique community who leave us from time to time.

This week we reflect on the life of Tony Furness, the retired KwaZulu-Natal trainer who has passed on after an extended illness, aged 83. While Tony was not a regular headline-hitter, he was a fine horseman from a family whose contributions to the sport are woven into the tapestry of racing in South Africa. 

Tony acquired his skills from his father, Rhodesian-born Tim Furness, a man who left an indelible mark on SA racing in a relatively short training career, in which he was the first trainer-of-choice for the Oppenheimer family and won their first Durban July in 1959 with Tiger Fish, ridden by Benny Little.

In a 2010 interview, some years after he retired, Tony said that he wanted to be a trainer from as young as eight years of age when his father ran a racing yard, first on a farm near Boksburg and later at the Newmarket racing village in Alberton. But Mr. Furness didn’t want young Tony to follow in his footsteps and he was sent back to the then Rhodesia to work on a tobacco farm, the industry which had employed his dad for a large part of his working life.

The lure of horseracing soon took Tony out of Africa to the stables of leading trainer Peter Walwyn in the UK, where he worked as a stable lad, the traditional hard ‘break’ into racing for enthusiastic youngsters.

Tim Furness retired soon after Tiger Fish had won the July. In fact, recalled Tony, his father had a spectacular last season and went out in style with many winners for the Oppenheimers. He was succeeded by John Breval.

Tim and Tony went back for a spell in Rhodesia, but soon returned to settle in Durban. They put 20 Zimbabwean horses on a train from (then) Salisbury and started out with a small string based at the old Newmarket stable complex near the Durban beachfront.

Tony was only 21 when he took out his own licence in 1963 and he got a good kickstart with some decent horses owned by his dad and some of the old man’s former patrons. His first two runners were winners, the first one being La Vete, owned by Mr Furness.

Tony was joined by Natal’s ‘Sugar King’, Doug Saunders (father of Chris), who moved his horses from top trainer Fred Rickaby, an association which brought him a number of quick feature-race successes, especially with the progeny of Sea Cottage’s sire Fairthorn. They included Fair Son (KZN Derby and JG Hollis Memorial); Glenthorne, Devon Port and Fair Blend.

He said: “Mr Saunders left not long after he joined me, taking his horses back to Rickaby. He never told me why. But he was a kind and generous man and gave me his version of a ‘golden handshake’ by leaving five top horses in my care including Fair Son, and allowing them to race in my own colours.’’

Tony battled for a while, but then received the patronage of Rhodesian millionaire Douglas C. Lilford, also known as ‘The Boss’. He was instrumental in forming former Prime Minister Ian Smith's Rhodesian Front party in 1962 and was brutally murdered on his farm in a politically motivated attack in 1985. Lilford owned Mr Chips (Ulysses II), a horse Tony described as a brilliant stayer, and Derby-placed Abel. Also from this era came a top sprinter, Actor, by Herculaneum. Mr Chips was a rare Furness raider to the Highveld, where long distance runners from Durban often failed, but he won two Transvaal Handicaps over 3200m.

Tony recalled: “We got our horses very fit in those days, because there were no training tracks at Newmarket. We took them to the beach every morning and they galloped on the sand. Every day was different, sometimes the sand was heavy, sometimes light. Some days we worked at the water’s edge, other times further up on heavy sand. Every trainer had his own methods for working out training programmes, but those sure were good days. For grass gallops we had to lead the horses up Argyle Road to the track at Greyville.’’

All the Newmarket trainers were hastily moved to the newly established Summerveld in the mid 1960s when the Durban City Council announced that they were going to break the stables down for an office building development. But the Newmarket stables remained there until well into the 2000s and this is where many of the KZN bloodstock auction sales were held.

Tony told: “Summerveld was rough and covered in wattle. On the first day they opened it for training, a horse ran into something at the end of the sand track and broke its neck. There was a lot of travelling from Shongweni to Durban and Pietermaritzburg and it was muddy, one of the rainiest seasons in history. We were on the back foot!”

Interestingly in 1966 Tony trained a stayer called Billingshurst (Barak), a Maiden he entered for the Natal Derby. “The race was run in pouring rain,’’ he said. “Billingshurst was a mudlark and he stayed on best, beating the top horse Jollify, who would go on to dead-heat with Sea Cottage in the 1967 Durban July.’’

Tony’s own July entries yielded two close seconds with Sun Tonic (Kirsch Flambee, 1979) and French Mustard (Free Ride, 1981). 

He recalled: “I got Sun Tonic by chance when he was moved from my neighbour, Aubrey Roberts. He was already an established horse and went on to win the old Republic Day Handicap of 1979 by four lengths. My stable jockey was the late Brian Deyes, a really good rider who got the mount in the July, but I believe Brian had the horse too far back on the day. They turned for home at the back of the field and was unable to reel in the winner, Over The Air.

“Brian was just as disappointed as I was. He didn’t come to work for a few weeks after that and was surprised when I put him on Sun Tonic again in the Woolavington Stakes a month after the July. This time he rode a peach of a race and Sun Tonic got up to win by a short head.’’

French Mustard wasn’t given much of a chance, he was an outsider and we were lucky to get Michael Roberts to ride him. ‘Muis’ had no other option really, as the ride he had initially booked was withdrawn. At the time he was still looking for his first July win. French Mustard ran a big race, he closed in on the leaders over the last 250m and looked like he was going to run on by, but Big Charles kept going under Jimmy Anderson, a jockey who was hard to beat when he got to the front.’’

He had more memories: “I once saddled two runners on one day, both ridden by apprentice jockeys who scored their first career wins. One was David Payne and the other was Richard Roberts. I also won with the only two runners I ever raced with in Port Elizabeth, including the PE Derby with Rose Court (Court Martial). He was also ridden by Michael Roberts.”

Tony won two G1 Gold Cups with Fauvist (St Cuthbert) and Hedge (Bagdad) respectively and says: “Sun Tonic was the best I ever trained, but Hedge was my favourite horse. He was a beautiful animal with a marvellous temperament. He was literally useless at home, never ever won a gallop, but on the racetrack he was a top stayer and gave his best every time.’’

In 1997 he trained League Title (Model Man) to win the G1 Paddock Stakes in the hands of the talented Andrew Fortune and he said: “She had terrible feet, probably the best filly I had but we had to scratch her often.’’

He praised Fortune, who later became National Champion and now resides in Australia: “Andrew is a gifted rider, truly brilliant. He was my stable jockey for a while in the 1990s. I read an article on him recently (2009) where he spoke about smoking substances at the training track before gallops in his wild, young days. I chuckled, because at that time he was riding for me and I always suspected something, but never said a word because he was such a freak of a good jockey!’’

Tony’s close friend Alistair Gordon, speaking in the wake of his death, said: “Tony was one of those good trainers who just needed a break to hit the big time. He trained for 38 years and retired in 2001 when he hit a tough patch, but that was too soon. He had good years left in the game. He missed his horses, especially in the last years of his life. Most of his friends in racing, like Robin Scott, had passed on. Tony will be fondly remembered. We were rival trainers at Summerveld until he retired and then we became good mates. We took trips to the bush to unwind, he had a good sense of humour and we enjoyed a brandy or two.”

Leading KZN trainer Wendy Whitehead, a former assistant to Tony Furness, commented: “Mr. Furness was a brilliant and knowledgeable man and a strict taskmaster. He lived a simple life when he stopped training. His house in Hillcrest is adorned with beautiful flowers, gardening became his passion. He still enjoyed racing, he often popped into my stables to visit.”

Furness is survived by his life partner Margot von Michaelis, three children and three grandchildren.