When we look at small children we can fantasise about what they will become; a doctor, a lawyer, a surfer etc. Then we have to wait and see where life’s twist and turns take them.

Becky Miller will in the next few years see the future for the “babies” she looks after. It may be while watching the Melbourne Cup or Golden Slipper and even then, she may not know it is one of hers.

The beauty and majesty of a thoroughbred horse in full flight is a sight to behold but they weren’t always the sleek and powerful equine animals we admire.

“When they first come into the barn they would have their little fluffy winter coats and they kind of look a little bit ugly, no offence to them.” Becky said. “But in the few months that you prep them for sale they would bulk out so much and grow.

“Like they just turned into these solid horses that are ready to go and get trained, it’s amazing.”

Yearling sales in Australia generate enormous sums of money with the 2025 Inglis Premier Yearling sales seeing $112 million paid for around 1,100 yearlings. That is around $100,000 each with the top sales being an even $1 million.

So that makes it vital the yearlings are looked after and cared for.

“Oh yeah, they are beyond looked after.” Becky says, sounding a little like an exasperated mother. “Like any small nick or cut, if they look like there’s something wrong with them, if they’re not quite as bright as they normally are, it would be call the vet or we’d all be like ‘something’s wrong with this horse, what can we do?”

I met Becky at the Cloncurry Derby Day races and she told me of her desire to go and work with yearlings and almost immediately she was gone. She applied just before Derby Day (early November) and soon after Derby Day received a phone call from the stud manager Jade Rosington.

“They were chasing someone who had a bit of horse experience that could help them to deal with the yearlings and I got hired like fairly straight away and then I left.”

Starting date was December 1 so her father Neil and Becky down to her new lodgings. Located about 10 minutes north of Scone in the famous Hunter Valley Willow Park Stud is a 700-acre boutique broodmare farm.

Owned and operated by the respected Glenn Burrows in recent years Willow Park has produced 49 Stakes winners. When you consider this is from an average crop size of around 400 annually it is a pretty good strike rate.

“I think we sort of, yearlings that went to sale, there was, I think we ended up with about 31 at one stage. And then there would have been. Oh, I don't know, probably 40 to 50 foals by the end of it, I think. I'm not sure on the exact numbers.”

Willow Park weans their foals about 4 to 6 months old and while lots of studs have separate properties Willow Park keeps the broodmares and foals on the same property but in separate areas.

“A lot of the studs do it differently, but we like, we'd sort of go cold turkey, so you'd bring them up, put the foals in the barn so that they're in a stable so they can't run around and try and jump out and hurt themselves, and then we'd just load all the mares onto the truck and take them to the other side of the farm.”

The foals would go into stables for a week or so and then into smaller paddocks but they were given time to adjust to life without mum.

“We had 2 girls, which were sort of the weanling handlers,” Becky explained. “They would give them a day or two because obviously the 1st few days they're very stressed and they just don't really want to be a part of the world, which is fair enough.”

Once they settled down the girls would beging to transition them through by going through the basics like leading them and brushing them and getting them used to being handled.

While some studs just leave the foals until they wean them and then begin handling them as weanlings Willow Park prefers to get them prepared earlier. From about three weeks until they’re weaned staff go through and handle them once a week.

Becky spent most of her time with the sales yearlings and called her work what she calls behind the scenes work. She and three or four other girls would feed them and handle them and brush them, look after them, preping them for the sales.

“We'd sort of go out in the morning, take them for walks to teach them, then put them out in turnouts and clean up the stalls and make feeds. Pretty much just do all the daily care that they need so that they can look their best when they send them to the sales.”

Glenn Burrows’ father was a trainer and breeder and at 16 Glenn joined renowned auction house William Inglis and Son in the pedigree department. He resigned some 20 years later as bloodstock manager when he purchased Willow Park. 

He goes through the weanling’s breeding, looks at how they are growing and what the current market is doing to decide which are suitableto go to sale and what to keep on the farm.

Willow Park sent yearlings to the Gold Coast, the Inglis Classic Yearling Sale, Inglis Easter Yearling’s Sale and one or two others. So was Becky surprised at the amount they got sold for?

“Oh yeah, yeah, that was a, that was a bit of a like, oh, oh, oh moment.”

Becky also had a male capture her heart during her time at Willow Park.

“He was a classic colt who got passed in at sale.” She said with a smile. “He was just really boisterous, and he'd just want to play every time you'd take him for a walk, he just thought the world was the biggest joke.

“He was just a proper dude to be around.”

While a lot of time and effort goes into a thoroughbred’s race name they are usually given everyday stable names. So how do you follow their racing career when they are officially named after they leave the farm.

“One of the girls that's been at Willow Park for a fare while follows all of their careers through racing. So I can send her a message abd be like ‘hey, what's the updates on this fella, like, what did they end up naming him? Where did he go?”

Becky and her elder sister Jess were born in Katherine in the Northern Territory while mum and dad worked about 160k west on Margaret Downs Station.

Currently working at Undilla, her family’s Station near Camooweal, Becky will see one or two former thoroughbreds enjoying their best life while she toils away. The family have had a history of racing around the North West District.

“Granddad's always been big on the racehorses, as everyone knows.”

Beccy’s grandparents Lindsey and Margaret Miller have for years raced dozens of winning horses with neighbouring station owners and close friends Lloyd and Wendy Hick. Several years ago they turned their hand to breeding their own, through Wendy.

Wendy purchased a couple of brood mares, including Magic Idol who produced one of the best horses of the past decade in regional Queensland. Deadly Choices.won a Cleveland Bay Handicap in Townsville, a Country Cups Challenge Final in Brisbane as well as running second by a short margin in a Battle of the Bush decider at Eagle Farm.

They have also raced bush Cup-winning horses such as Regulus, who also won in Brisbane back in 2006, and Sandwood.

Deadly Choices provided a hell of a ride for connections and as a reward is living his best life in retirement on the Hick’s property.

Becky started doing a few odd jobs at the races such as strapping for Tamara and Jay Morris and then she started clerking. Fresh from finishing school she was looking for a challenge and a change and was considering applying to be a stable hand in a proper racing stable before fate stepped in.

“I was like, I kind of want to go and do something and then Jade's ad literally just popped up on Facebook and I was like, oh, that actually kind of looks pretty cool.”

She did some research into it and decided that it would indeed be really cool to see where they start before they hit the racetrack. Like any youngster Becky isn’t looking to far ahead but definitely wants to go back to Willow Park at the end of the year.

“It'd be awesome to go back and see everyone again, it's a great environment down there, it's a lot of fun.”

Working with horses is a way of life and so conditions for workers are not always five-star but as in most cases those conditions forge friendships. Becky stayed on the farm 24/7 with the other girls and every second weekend they’d go and do something.

Scone was less than half hour away and Tamworth was visited a couple of times. They were never too far away in case someone needed something but she also made a trip toward Newcastle through the Hunter Valley, country much different to what she normally travels.

“Oh definitely, there's a big difference.”

When asked if it is the perfect environment and temperature for horse studs she affirms it is one of the reasons.

“I think it's got a lot to do with it. Like, all the big races are down in that country and it's just really prime country to grow and breed horses on.”

So can she spot a champion from after this experience?

“I feel like you never really can pick one out of them, but it sort of helped me gain like the knowledge of what the ideal racehorse sort of looks like from the start. You'd look through the foals and be like, oh, he's a bit short-legged or is not the most brightest horse or something like that.

“In saying that some of them can hit the racetrack and they surprise everyone. It'll be amazing to see where some of them end up.”