Annie Cowles is hoping to make every post a winner after becoming the first woman president of the Geraldine Trotting Club.

That makes her one of only a handful of women throughout the country to make it to the top job in a once male-dominated sport.

Since the club was formed 60 years ago only one other woman has had her feet under the committee table and she lasted only a year.

Mrs Cowles will, however, have plenty of work to do as the club survives on a shoestring budget.

She said she will take that in her stride and believes the club is well on the way back up.

"When the Geraldine Racing Club left and went to Timaru the place almost went to rack and ruin, but the turnaround's been great, thanks largely to the community support," Mrs Cowles said.

Although they run only one meeting a year at their Orari track it is becoming known as a great day out, with Christmas parties and corporates all becoming part of the festivities.

This year it is part of the "Christmas at the Races" promotion and all the mini marquees have been sold for the November 28 meeting.

Mrs Cowles said that while it was hard work, as they were all volunteers, it was also fun.

"Luckily I have a great committee. They are a really good bunch and fortunately also have a background in business," she said. The new president said it was important to attract as many people as possible to Orari on race day to keep the tote ticking over to boost their income.

While they shared the facilities with a couple of resident trainers, a pony club and archers and grazed the inside of the track, it was still hard to make money, but that just made the committee more determined.

The Geraldine Trotting Club is also an important part of the community in some ways with many families involved from the start. "It's nice to see family traditions carrying on."

Mrs Cowles was brought up going to the races, in particular the trots, and her father was a long-serving committee member.

"My first job after leaving school was with the then secretary of the local racing clubs, Leo Oliff, so I did my apprenticeship with him."

Back then everything was done manually by typewriter with about six carbon copies.

In 1987 Mrs Cowles and her husband Russell moved to Hamilton where they were "bitten by the bug" and became involved in racing syndicates.

"We didn't make any money out of them but gained plenty of friends." Back in Geraldine in 2001 she was persuaded to join the Orari Equestrian Centre, which is the body that administers the race course and progressed from there taking over from David Bray, who had held the reins for 13 years.

Source: Stu Piddington - The Timaru Herald