Billy Cray and Krissie Simpkins: Racing couple have formed a formidable partnership

A case in point: English jockey Billy Cray.

The London-raised, Muswellbrook-based hoop is an adventurous type. With the English racing season beset by winter, he was riding in Bahrain when he visited a friend in Sydney in late 2016.

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"And I just thought, 'What a good life this is,' and just decided I'd give it six months," he said. "And I just stayed, and it's built from there."

He added: "It's worked out really well."

Yes, it has.

Almost three years ago, the 33-year-old was riding at Gilgandra when he got adventurous again and made his move, in a very English way, on Krissie-lea Simpkins.

"I just thought she was a bit of all right and a bit special," he said. "So I asked her out with my best chat-up line of, 'Do you want a cup of tea and a biscuit?'

"It worked, because no one had ever offered her that before."

On Christmas eve, the couple's son, Alby, turned one. And on Boxing Day, the trainer and the jockey teamed up at Quirindi Racecourse to win the Cactus Wilson Memorial (1100m) with Twittersphere.

Simpkins - the daughter of Gilgandra trainer Bryan Dixon and a mother of three - began training full-time 20 months ago.

Cray - a winner of 118 races in Australia for $2.3 million in prize money - has ridden six of her eight career winners. Their best day came at Mudgee on October 23, when they had three first placegetters.

"To be honest, we get on really well," Cray said. "She knows what she's good at [as a trainer] and lets me get on with the racing. And she's really good at training them, because I don't have a clue about that side."

Simpkins said training had been "a bit of a roller coaster".

"I think the hardest part is having babies, and trying to manage it all," she said. "But, no, it's been really good."

She added: "It's been probably more rewarding than I thought it would have been, to begin with."

Working so much with Cray was "a massive advantage", Simpkins said, because "he gets to ride them all at home. And, obviously, he knows them inside out.

"So when we go to the races, I'm not worried about trying to explain a horse to somebody. So that makes a massive difference, and much easier on my behalf."

Cray hopes to "soon" marry Simpkins, although no wedding date has been set. "But one day, hopefully," he said.

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