Racing world loses veteran horse trainer and breeder
Mick Preston devoted life to industry
Well-known Levin horse trainer and breeder Brendan Arthur Vivian (Mick) Preston died early last week. He was 90. Preston, possibly best remembered for training Imaprince to win the 1985 Wellington Cup, had a lifelong involvement in the thoroughbred racing industry as an owner, breeder, trainer and trader of racehorses.
From a racing family, his grandfather Arthur Edward Preston arrived from Liverpool in the late 1890s and worked hard to build up a line of butcher shops around Wellington, enabling him to pursue an interest in thoroughbred horse racing and breeding.
Mick’s father Arthur Edmund (Ted) carried on the butchery business and also inherited his passion for racing, founding West Derby Stud after purchasing a large property in Tararua Road in Levin after WWII.
Mick was the eldest of six sons, all of whom served butchery apprenticeships while still at secondary school, though he was handy with the horses, too.
In his late teens, Preston spent a season employed at Lord Derby’s Woodland Stud in Newmarket, England, an experience he would never forget.
At the time the stud stood one of the thoroughbred world’s most influential sires, Hyperion, and he was the stallion’s handler during the ninemonth stint.
Preston returned to New Zealand in late 1952 to complete his compulsory three-month military training, after which he became studmaster at West Derby Stud, which stood stallions such as Knight’s Romance and Defoe.
He began training racehorses in Levin and also rode in amateur races. His first winner was Deep Gold in 1954. He also trained horses at Otaki for a time. Among the top horses he trained were High Delight, His Grace, Eugenie, Huka Falls, No Offence, Kindling, Orelino, Lord Erin, Trail By Jury, Big Bill and Harvest Moon.
Imaprince also won the New Zealand St Leger, in an era when both it and the Wellington Cup had Group One status. The horse finished seventh in the 1985 Melbourne Cup.
More latterly Preston had enjoyed success as an owner through the deeds of top galloper True Enough, a horse he bred himself, by Palmerston North stallion Nom De Jeu from a mare he raced called Valda’s Dream.
Preston was a life member of the Levin Racing Club and spent decades serving on the club’s committee. He was part of the LRC that established the Levin Classic in the early 1980s, which at the time was one of the richest races in Australasia.
In recent years he had retired to Taupo. He is survived by wife Valda, six children, 12 grandchilden and 15 great-grandchildren.