HE was dubbed "The Cup King" of his era but when it came to the Melbourne Cup jockey John Thomas Anderson only got to experience the electric atmosphere as a spectator.
"Every time I saw it I wanted to be there [in the saddle]," says Anderson, of Hastings, who watched "the race that stops two nations" three times in his life at Flemington.
But the bloke, who is known in the racing circles as "JT", will today fulfil his ambition of getting close to the 18-carat gold Emirates Melbourne Cup, thanks to the Victoria Racing Club gesture.
Long retired now, the 84-year-old resident of Mary Doyle Retirement Village in Havelock North will relish getting up close and personal with the cup touring Hawke's Bay as part of its 14th annual tour of New Zealand and Australia.
Moving around with the help of a walking frame these days, Anderson will make the most of the photo opportunity during the hour-long morning tea stop at Riverstone Cafe at the retirement home from 10am.
From there the cup will go to Te Mata Peak for more photo opportunities to the public until midday.
The $183,000 symbol of the world's richest "two-mile" (3200km) race will then be taken to the Sasanof Lodge along 57 Longlands Rd West RD5, Hastings, for 45 minutes from 1pm to sit alongside the 1916 Melbourne Cup.
Between 3.30pm and 4.30pm, it'll be on display at Clubs Hastings, at the corner of Victoria and Hastings streets, before a final appearance at the Turks Bar and TAB Havelock North from 5pm to 6pm.
So what stopped a saddle-savvy Anderson from competing in the feature race of 13 at the Flemington racecourse on the first Tuesday of November from 3pm (5pm NZ time)?
"A horse," quips the jockey who the media and racing aficionado dubbed "The Cup King" in 1962.
"I suppose I used to win everything at the time," he says self effacingly.
The reality was Anderson had won two Hawke's Bay Gold Cups on farmer/owner Doug Lang's horse, Picaroon, who went by the stable name of "Pickles".
But Pickles "was a moody old rooster" when factoring in the Melbourne Cup.
Another, Froth, a New Zealand Oaks winner, was capable although 1800m was her distance and the 3200m cup may have been a bridge too far. 1963 Auckland Cup winner Stipulate could have been a goer for a jockey who rode at Flemington but that was always the owners' call, not to mention the cost of shipping a horse in those days.
His best mate, Ronnie "Scunge" Taylor, a Cambridge stud owner, he suspects will be at Melbourne Cup in November.
Anderson, who racked up 400 winners predominantly around the Bay from the late 1950s to early 1960s, was born in Blackball on the West Coast of South Island to a coal mining family.
At 14 the red head put his modest belongings into a suitcase to become an apprentice jockey under Cecil Humphries at Riccarton, Christchurch.
"I left home by a horse float, arriving at the stables at six stone [38kg]," he reflects.
"The smaller you were the better your career," says Anderson after the then Blackball Hotel publican endorsed his potential to Humphries who used to train his two horses.
His father, the late Jack Anderson, didn't have a clue what a jockey was.
Crawling down coal mining shafts and tunnels like his dad was never on the younger Anderson's agenda.
"The smaller you were the better your [jockey] career," he says, impressing on his father he was "too light for heavy work and too heavy for light work".
Anderson stayed five years with Humphries after his maiden victory on Faithful Pal at the Banks Peninsula track, coming in his fifth mount.
He racked up about 40 winners a year after completing his apprenticeship.
It was hard yakka, though. He recalls winters so cold in an aerated whare for jockeys that a bowl of water left outside for them to wash their faces in winter would often had to be broken as ice to be used. The riders shivered but the horses were clad in double rugs at night. Pinching the top rug at night and rising "at sparrow fart" in the mornings to return it before the boss pinged them.
In his sixth year, the then 19-year-old, who got married to Pauline Clarkson in Christchurch, gravitated towards Matamata and Hamilton for some "moderate success" for the next four years.
They have a daughter, Kaye, who moved with husband Mike Child to Hamilton recently after living in Sydney for many years.
"The riders were totally different. They were more experienced than we were.
"I had a lot to learn. I was getting the hang of riding winners quicker."
Anderson, who won six times on Royal Tan from a dozen attempts, doesn't waver when asked what constitutes a savvy jockey.
"Good horses make good riders," says the man who moved down to Hastings to work for owner/trainer Keith Couper at the Glazebrook property, what is now the Ngatarawa winery estate.
The move was a no brainer for someone who wanted to be in a central location to capitalise on meetings around the North Island.
It was a punishing routine here. He was up at 4am to do track work on Wednesdays in the hope of catching the trainers' eye for a ride on Saturday meetings.
"They have it easy these days with top jockeys not having to do track work nowadays."
Invercargill jockey trainer, the late Bert Phillips, also moved to Hastings after he and Anderson had had dealings in Matamata.
A grinning Anderson recalls how Jack Leith, the owner of Jack's Corner, had once demanded Phillips replace him as a jockey.
"Jack's Corner had won a few handicap races and wouldn't have won another cup unless others had all fallen over.
"So Bert said to Leith, 'No problems, you can find a new jockey and while you're at it you can find a new trainer and house for your horse'."
Phillips' loyalty paid off as Anderson went on to win a few more races "on the donkey".
During his Hastings stint, the jockey rode three consecutive Ormond Gold Cup winners on the same mount.
"Luck," he replies when asked what the secret was. "I had loads of it but it wasn't easy."
Twist his arm and Anderson, who won consecutive HB Centennial Gold Cups on Bernie (1957) and Birdie (1958), agrees a rider had to be brave and make some huge sacrifices.
"Wasting", the ritual of shedding weight, was on the top of the agenda for a jockey who grappled with his share of weight demons.
"I lived on whatever came my way but in minimal amounts," says the man who retired at 44 in 1976.
"I can't remember the last time I had Christmas dinner because I always had races the next day for 30 years."
It wasn't unusual to see Anderson don three sets of winter-weight running gear at the height of summer to pound the pavements of Hastings because he despised using saunas.
"I didn't take tablets at all. It was always the very last measure.
"I was walking 9 stone 7lbs most weeks and riding in the weekends at 7 stone 11 - it knocked the shit out of you. It certainly shortens your career to have to waste that hard," he told the Thoroughbred Racing Monthly in 2001.
Anderson shook the Queen's hand after winning a race on Moy at the QEII Handicap on February 16, 1963.
The late William "Bill" Angus, who operated the Angus Hotel in Hastings, owned Moy.
The sparkle returns in the eyes of Anderson as he recalls his acquaintance with the Queen, after winning the feature double at a special royal meeting in Riccarton - QE Hcp on Moy and Duke of Edinburgh Stakes Sprint on Key - in 1959. He was in the changing room, switching from Moy's colours to another for the last ride after the feature race, when a royal aide turned up to ask him to meet the Queen.
"I told him to bugger off because I was getting ready for another race."
The big wigs at Riccarton had to take over, persuading Anderson to slip back into Moy's colours to complete the royal ritual.
"I didn't like any of it. I just shook her hand and we had a short conversation. The old Duke was there as well."
The money in riding was good but Anderson moonlighted as a construction worker.
"I was a builder's labourer, doing everything from digging to mixing concrete."
Anderson, who won four consecutive Awapuni Gold Cups on Froth, "a real good racehorse who always tried her best for me anyhow".
"There was nothing special about Froth but knowing her helped in a big way," he says of a mare he rode to Auckland Cup victory on New Year's Day in 1959 and then followed it up with Queen Elizabeth Hcp.
Anderson, who rode Jalna to Great Northern Oaks glory, eventually retired as an assistant starter (barriers) at Ellerslie Racecourse, Auckland, in 2010.
"I wouldn't change a thing," he says when asked if he would have done anything differently in his career.