BECOMING TYLER
At 16, Tyler Leslight – then a girl with a different name – made an appointment at a gender clinic. Today he’s Australia’s first transgender jockey
While many sportspeople have been looking at their shoes when the controversial “T” word is mentioned – transgender – one man is staring the world squarely in the eye.
Meet Tyler Leslight, the Queensland jockey who has transitioned from being born a girl.
While just about everyone is tiptoeing around the complex issue of transgender sportspeople, the man in the middle, Leslight, is disarmingly relaxed.
First and foremost, Leslight wants to be known as a jockey. But as he tries to find a pathway in the cut-throat racing industry, he understands the interest in his personal life.
While racing is a sport where male and female riders compete against each other on a level playing field, some in society are still battling with ingrained awkwardness over the transgender issue.
Leslight has just one request – if you have a question about him, don’t whisper it to a friend.
Simply ask him.
“People can talk behind your back and make assumptions and I would rather people just come up to me, I am pretty straightforward,” Leslight says.
“I went to a Catholic school in Victoria and it was very straight minded, I didn’t even know that transgender people existed.
“When I was young I didn’t care about being girly, I never liked wearing makeup, and we always had horses growing up so if I wasn’t at school I was with the horses.
“I didn’t have many school friends so the first person I confided in about things was my personal trainer at the time.
“I then had to go to my GP and tell him what I was thinking and he referred me on to the Monash gender clinic in Melbourne.
“When I was 16, I signed on to a waiting list and I think it took six months to even go in and see the psychologist. I was very nervous before my first appointment because I was worried they wouldn’t believe me.”
Leslight, 22, has long wanted to be a jockey and has taken the road less travelled as he tries to live his dream. Originally from northern NSW, Leslight worked in a number of stables in Victoria before moving to Queensland and eventually being taken on by renowned Darling Downs trainer Tony Sears.
When opportunities there dried up, champion Queensland country trainer Bevan “Billy” Johnson and his wife Mel came calling as they were looking for an apprentice jockey to be based at their Moranbah stables.
Moranbah is a coal mining town, more than 1000km from Brisbane and 150km southwest of Mackay, and is known for its squadron of FIFO mine workers as well as being the birthplace of rugby league star Josh Hannay, the current Queensland Maroons and Cronulla Sharks assistant coach.
Moranbah’s Treasure Park racecourse is where we met Leslight as he rode trackwork on the dirt track on a clear winter morning.
Leslight and the Johnsons not only work on track but they also live there, with Mel holding the position of president of the race club, which hosts three meetings a year.
The Moranbah racing scene is currently best known for being the home of champion bush horse Fab’s Cowboy, which has won an incredible 48 races for the Johnsons and is chasing down the modern-day Australian record of 51. Fab’s Cowboy will always hold a place in Leslight’s heart, the quirky 10-yearold galloper giving the young hoop his first win as a jockey at Gladstone in April.
Taking a break from his stable duties, Leslight admits he has faced some difficult times in his transformation to become a male.
Some in his family no longer speak to him – he says he has no relationship with his mother.
But Leslight can also see the lighter side of life as he tells how he celebrated his 18th birthday by deciding on his new names.
“I downloaded a baby name app on my phone and I just rolled through and picked out Tyler,” Leslight chuckles. “I don’t tell people what my name as a girl was.
“When I picked out a boy name, to be honest I didn’t really even think about it too much.
“I officially changed my name on my 18th birthday, so that was a bit of fun.
I downloaded a baby name app on my phone and I just rolled through and picked out Tyler
“I didn’t mind Tyler and my middle name is now Harris – I picked that because my dad told me they were going to call me Harrison if I had been born a boy.
“I am very happy with my life these days and I have a good relationship with my dad.
“But I’m not willing to let certain people back in because what is done is done and that ship has sailed.”
In the Johnson racing stables, Bevan might be the head trainer but wife Mel is the real “general” and that’s often what she answers to.
From the first time they talked on the phone, Mel Johnson has been in Leslight’s corner.
Mel Johnson has a no-nonsense attitude: “Tyler identifies as male and that’s great, he can carry four buckets around the stables and I will carry two!”
But the Johnsons also know that “bushies” are sometimes not the most accepting people and Leslight saw it first-hand when he rode at Augathella in April.
It prompted Mel Johnson to draw a line in the sand and take to social media.
“Something to think about before you speak … Tyler Leslight is a part of Johnson Racing Stables,” she wrote, in a passionate Facebook post.
“Since joining our stable, Tyler has shown that he is an honest, reliable worker with a will to learn and a passion for horses and racing.
“Tyler is kind, with a good eye for detail and a gentle hand with the horses.
“He is also showing that he has the ability to become a handy jockey.
“It matters not to us anything else.
“We applaud his determination, dedication and tenacity to pursue his dreams and to be who he wants to be. May we all be as strong in our journey through life to find happiness even when faced with adversity.
“Those who wish to judge, please take a good look in the mirror first and let’s see if you are ideally perfect as your society apparently deems … bet you’re not.
“It shouldn’t matter though, we should be judged only on our merits, character and the size of our hearts. The rest is irrelevant.
“Those who truly know us, know we are fiercely loyal. We have a son with Asperger’s who is bullied daily by schoolchildren … unacceptable! Therefore, we have an expectation of adults … childish remarks on any of our posts will not be tolerated.
“If you can’t behave maturely then save me some time and simply remove yourself from our friends list! You will not be missed #Speakevenifyourvoiceshakes #bullyingstopsnow.”
Soon after the post, the Johnsons felt things change for Leslight in his new bush life and the jockey did too.
“I think us just taking that stand that we are behind him, and in his corner, was a big thing,” Mel Johnson says.
“I don’t think too many people were wanting to argue with me. After that there were so many positive comments. It really lifted Tyler.”
Leslight will turn 23 later this year and it will mark eight years since he started his path towards transitioning.
There were countless visits to psychologists and clinics up until his 18th birthday when he was permitted to start using hormones.
Given he has transitioned from female to male – and jockeys of both sexes compete against each other – Leslight says the hormone process has been relatively straightforward for him in both his personal and jockey life.
But it has still thrown up some issues – he had to get the green light from racing authorities who have to tick off virtually everything a jockey puts in their body.
“Essentially the hormones put you through male puberty,” Leslight says.
“I had to get approval from the Queensland Racing Integrity Commission for the drugs, that goes for anybody on any medication as you have to get it approved by the chief steward.
“The stewards have been great.
Every time I get drug swabbed they ask if I want a female or a male officer with me because they have to watch me do it.
“I don’t really care whether it’s a male or a female officer to be fair, they are there to do a job and so am I.
“In terms of the jockey rooms in the bush, there are a lot of dual-sex jockey rooms where jockeys of both sexes are all in the same room anyway.”
Leslight packed his whole life into the back of a horse float when he made the move to Moranbah and he already feels like it’s the best move he has ever made.
With just a handful of winners to his name in the bush, Leslight knows he has a long way to go to make the grade as a professional jockey.
But he is a quick learner and won’t get seduced by any trappings of fame as there are none in down-to-earth Moranbah.
Leslight doesn’t party, hardly drinks and saves his pennies.
While many Group 1-winning jockeys in the big smoke live in mansions and drive flash cars, Leslight is recycling aluminium cans so he can pay to get his own car repaired. But don’t you worry, it’s a nice little earn as Bevan Johnson is known to enjoy a few refreshing ales after work.
“I’m getting 10 cents a can and the first lot I took to be recycled, I got $250,” Leslight laughs.
“I need a new water pump in my car, so I am using that money to pay for that.
“I am just really keen to put my head down and my bum up and work as hard as I can.
“I don’t really drink, I might have one drink at night sometimes just to be social where I will sit down and talk with Billy and Mel about random stuff.
“Only in the last few weeks have I really started to get a bit of proper confidence about riding, before that it still felt like every day was the first day when I was getting on a horse.
“It wasn’t so much about the riding itself, but I would get a little bit anxious about the expectations of winning and that got to me a little bit. Now that’s starting to fade away.
“I want to spend at least 12 months in the bush learning how to ride properly and if and when I’m good enough to move closer to the city, Billy will tell me and he will set it up for me.
“I’ve already come a long way as it wasn’t too long ago that I was falling off horses every week for a while there, I didn’t know how to ride really at all.
“Riding in the bush has been an adventure, I have seen a lot of things and ridden some good horses too.”
In many ways, Leslight and four-time Queensland premiership-winning trainer Bevan Johnson are like chalk and cheese.
But the unlikely duo has forged a close bond and Johnson, who has seen plenty of sometimes wayward apprentice jockeys come and go through his stable over the years, says the young hoop has the attitude to make a success of his chosen career.
“Tyler is dedicated, level-headed, and he is going to give it a go to the best of his ability,” Johnson says.
“He’s buggered up a few times, but he’s picked himself up the next day.
“We went to Mackay and he rode a favourite badly and he came back moping a bit and I told him he had better pick his lip up because I thought we could win some races the next day.
“He picked himself up and sure enough we won some more races.
“We are different sorts of blokes, I drink a six-pack every day and he doesn’t really drink. But we’ve had some great chats along the way.
“I was a bit worried about some of the bushies when Tyler first went to the races,
they were stand-offish at first. They didn’t really talk to him, but now they are ringing wanting to talk to him.
“As for the jockeys, some of them started to give him a bit of spice and curry. But I told Tyler how to come back at them, I said ‘don’t just sit in the corner as they will walk all over you’. I have a bit of background about certain jockeys, I have known a certain one for 30 years, and I just gave Tyler a bit of ammunition against them.”
Leslight has his own views on swimming’s historic decision to restrict transgender women from
taking part in elite female competitions, but he would prefer to keep them close to his chest.
He is more than happy to set the record straight about his own journey and feels his story may help those who are going through similar challenges. But he feels it’s not his place to add his young voice to the wider debate about transgender sportspeople.
Leslight wants to keep his head down and ride as many winners as he can – and also keep his bank balance ticking over by collecting more of those tin cans.
People can talk behind your back and make assumptions … I’d rather people just come up to me, I’m pretty straightforward
Riding in the bush has been an adventure