Family Confidential The Waterhouses

Family Confidential The Waterhouses

The racing family that has survived and thrived against the odds, the Waterhouses, tell of their bruising experience through four generations of bookmaking in Australia.

Gai Waterhouse is on top of her game now, having trained some of the biggest track winners in the country, but there was a time when the mud flew at this family and the going got very rough.

Family patriarch Bill, 87, has always enjoyed a reputation for toughness, from his struggling upbringing in a workers pub at the foot of the Sydney Harbour Bridge, to the loss of his livelihood after the scandalous Fine Cotton affair.

A hard and fast player, punting was his life and although family was important to him, his marriage to Suzanne foundered because he was rarely home.

Vilified in the press, and then turned on by family members, and dragged through the courts, he and son Robbie lived on their wits when the stakes were down and pulled the family through.

Now the next generation, grandson Tom Waterhouse is, at 27, the biggest single bookmaker in the country.

And Bill and Suzanne have set new odds on their partnership - on his terms.

Family Confidential The Waterhouses
Monday, 29 November 2010
8pm
ABC1
http://abc.net.au/iview