Thrilling finish in the 2004 Crown Oaks

For former jockey David Taggart, the transition to a life after racing came suddenly and painfully, and not in a way that he had ever expected. 

The victim of a horrific race fall that changed his life forever, there were times when Taggart wondered if he had a future at all. Today, he is resurrected and has found a new life behind a microphone. 

“When I think about the last 16 years of my life, it’s been an absolute roller coaster, one with a lot of dips to be honest. Gratefully, things are getting a lot better,” he said.

As an apprentice jockey Taggart had been part of a dream team group; Damien Oliver, Patrick Payne, Danny Nikolic, Brett Prebble and Taggart were the fresh young stars of the Australian racing scene and collectively they took the early 1990s by storm.

Taggart himself landed five of his six career Group 1 wins before he turned 22 years old. Lucrative contracts in Asia beckoned and the winners flowed freely, he was young, at the top of his game and on top of the world.

“We’ll never see a school like it again, think about what those jockeys went on to achieve. You’re talking about the cream of Australian racing for most of the next thirty years,” Taggart said.

“I rode my first Group 1 winner as an apprentice for Bart (Cummings) down the Flemington straight, it doesn’t get much better than that does it? But that was a long time ago.”

While most of his contemporaries were afforded the luxury of retiring on their own terms, Taggart’s career came to a crushing end in 2007 when a race fall at Stony Creek shattered both of his ankles. Ten separate operations over the next three years would send him plummeting into depression, battling mental demons as well as crippling chronic pain and wondering how it all went so wrong.

“I knew I was finished as soon as I hit the deck that day. The pain was unbearable. It was the worst time of my life. I was basically laid up in bed for six years. I lost my marriage, my family, it all just spiralled out of control,” he said.

“One day you're out there riding, doing what you do best, the next day you’re totally useless. It was very hard to deal with.”

In 2016 racing media company G1X contacted Taggart to make a short film about his fall. He reluctantly agreed, not wanting to expose his situation to the public, little did he know it would be a decision that would change his life.

“Saying yes was the best thing that happened. The doco got some traction and a month or so later G1X called again and asked if I wanted some work in their call centre. Just a day or two a week, four hours a day which was all I could physically handle, ringing punters on their database and talking racing.

“People remembered me which gave me such a lift. My confidence grew, I felt better, I started working more hours and it all snowballed from there.”

Rumours of Taggart’s cheeky and at times, candid, calls began to circulate and soon he was offered fill in spots on SEN radio, partnering with sports identity and horse breeder Simon O’Donnell and former top hoop Simon Marshall on a panel show called The Odds Couple. From those humble beginnings an unlikely star was born.

“I’ve never been short of a word and that helped, once I got my confidence back things started to happen. Now I work with SEN Track, have been for a few years now. I can do three to four days no problem, talking form and sharing the excitement of racing,” he said.

Taggart is one of SEN Track’s most popular identities and is still shocked when racing fans stop him for a photo and to tell him how much they enjoy his work.

“I’m so happy and just so grateful for the opportunity. As a young jockey I would always take whatever ride I could get so I could prove myself. Coming back to work was no different, once I got started, I just kept saying yes,” he said.

“It can be tough for athletes to find work after they retire, and if they are forced due to serious injury it’s even worse. My advice to anyone who is a bit lost after their career comes to an end is to just say yes, take the opportunity and run with it. Doing that saved my life.”