In Brief
- Castles home after NSW mission.
- Young driver tasted success interstate.
- Footy career on hold.
Wesley Vale junior driver Charlie Castles has shown ability in the sulky in his short career, and the reinsman recently returned back to the state after a two-month stint in New South Wales where he looked to further his development in the industry.
The chance arose when duel Inter Dominion trainer, and former Tasmanian James Rattray was looking for a junior driver to join his team.
“The last junior James had branched out shoeing horses, so James was looking for someone, Barrie (Rattray) got in touch with dad, and I ended up deciding to go up for two-months,” explained Castles.
Castles stint coincided with the Carnival Of Miracles where he was able to attend all nights of the carnival including the $1,000,000 Miracle Mile at Menangle.
“I got to see a lot of big players in the industry at work on the biggest stage, I certainly felt like I learnt a lot just being there and watching,” said the junior driver.
The Menangle track is no doubt the best in Australia being a staggering 1400 metres in circumference and Castles was lucky enough to have a couple of drives on the track.
“I had two drives there, and you certainly don’t feel like you are going 1:52, 1:53 until you look at the board after the race,” he said.
Castles also got to drive on many tracks including the recently opened new track at Wagga as well as drives at Goulburn, Newcastle, Young and Canberra where he had success.
“I liked the Canberra track a lot, it reminded me of a few tracks down here, it was just a nice boutique track,” said Castles about the track where he drove Joogle to victory early last month.
The 19-year-old said he was wrapt with the hospitality by James, who even allowed him to get some footy training in.
“James has invited me back, and I definitely will at some stage, the plan was to come home for the footy season,” said Castles.
Unfortunately for Castles, the footy season has been put on hold like many things in the world due to the COVID-19 pandemic, so he will have to wait a little while longer to pull on his Devonport Magpies guernsey.
Castles had put a lot of what he learnt with his trip away into practice over the past three meetings in Tasmania including a win aboard Estelle in Launceston last Sunday.
“She is one of my favourites, she tries hard and goes well in front,” said Castles about the three-year-olds first win at only her second career start.
Watch Estelle win in Launceston last week: