The Last Race Track (2007-2019)
I'm in the Jocks room at my local horse racing track, the historic, 1935 built Suffolk Downs, and I am photographing frenetically, shooting a rider getting weighed, a valet preparing a saddle, a jockey falling asleep on a bench in front of their equipment stall. With eighteen minutes until post-time Freddie makes the announcement “Rider's get ready for the Budddddddddweiser Special”, the same announcement he makes for the final race of each day. I make my way up the stairs to the paddock to photograph multi-colored clad jockeys mounting their horses before parading to the starting gate. The last race of the day is on the turf so I cross the dirt track and make my way to the inner grass oval. I decide to climb the eight metal stairs of a small viewing tower at the finish-line, to get a slightly different vantage point and from there I shoot the horses crossing the finish line. During the next five minutes I will have walked back across the track, taken photos of dismounting mud-covered jockeys, documented the track photographer shooting the traditional winners circle photo, have a few laughs with one of the trainers, shoot jockeys entering the scale house for the post-race weigh-in, and photograph horses being hosed down prior to their walk back to the backstretch where they will spend the night.
I had begun my Suffolk Downs project in 2007, and it came to an end when the track closed thirteen years later. The people that I met there were hardworking, open and honest, but they also felt unseen and underappreciated. As I spent more and more time photographing they were moved that I was paying attention to and appreciated them, and they took me under their wings, taught me the ropes, denied me nothing, and wholeheartedly accepted me into their track family.
Back at the Jock's room Freddie drags out an ice-filled trashcan full of Budweiser’s as we all begin the post-race day ritual of drinking beer, giving each other shit, and winding down after the intensity of the day. I am tired but glowing, and I can't wait to do it all again tomorrow.
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