Former Trackside producer Brad Taylor wins Melbourne Cup with ...

A former Trackside producer, who not that many years ago was organising the student tent at an Otago race track every first Tuesday of November, is now a Melbourne Cup winner.

An emotional Brad Taylor, now racing manager for Sam and Anthony Freedman in Victoria, recounted his incredible backstory to his former employer, Trackside TV, following his Melbourne Cup victory with Without A Fight at Flemington on Tuesday.

“A Wingatui boy on the big stage winning the Melbourne Cup, it’s just unbelievable,” Taylor said.

He was clutching a miniature Melbourne Cup, dished out to connections of the winning horse, as he attempted to come to terms with the biggest moment of his career on racing’s greatest day.

Taylor also revealed his proud mother was watching on from Wingatui – where a domestic New Zealand meeting is held on Melbourne Cup day annually – and he was able to share a quick conversation with her following Freedman Racing’s sixth victory in the Cup – but the first Taylor has been associated with.

“It’s bloody cool to be a part of and it’s an unreal feeling, I don’t know what to feel, to be honest,” Taylor said just a couple of hours on from Without A Fight’s 2-¼ lengths victory in the A$8.4 million race.

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Brad Taylor celebrates at Flemington with Without A Fight’s jockey Mark Zahra.

“Just to be a part of it, I’m only a very small part of it, but Sam and Anthony do a terrific job with the horse,” Taylor said.

Taylor graduated from Otago University in 2011 with a Bachelor of Educational studies and a postgraduate Diploma in Teaching Studies.

He began teaching full-time but was heavily involved with racing in the Otago region. His love of racing really got going when he was paired with his future best mate on the first day of primary school.

That was Jamie Richards, now a prominent horse trainer in Hong Kong.

It didn’t take long for copious messages to flow through on Tuesday evening, but Taylor said the one from Richards was the only one he replied to straight away.

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Brad Taylor and Elyse Zahra, wife of winning jockey Mark, celebrate Melbourne Cup glory.

There was no doubt in Taylor’s mind he owed his biggest success to the Richards family, especially Jamie and his father Paul.

“If it wasn’t for them, I wouldn’t be here today, I’d probably be driving trucks or a school teacher in New Zealand,” Taylor told Trackside TV.

“I owe everything to the Richards family.

“(A few) years ago me and Jamie (Richards) were organising the student tent at Wingatui on Melbourne Cup day and now we’re here winning the Cup,” he said.

The pair went on to work together at Te Akau in the Waikato region where Taylor was racing manager and Richards the head trainer.

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Mark Zahra salutes the crowd as Without A Fight wins the Melbourne Cup.

But there was someone else Taylor knew he couldn’t have got his Melbourne Cup victory without, another former Trackside staffer, his partner and Australian racing presenter Jayne Ivil.

“I wouldn’t be here without her,” Taylor said. “She got the job over here first.”

Taylor followed Ivil across the ditch and picked up the job with Freedman racing through, yet another, Trackside colleague who knew Sam Freedman.

What wasn’t lost on Taylor in his big moment was Without A Fight’s Melbourne and Caufield Cup double, meaning he was the first horse since the Kiwi-trained Ethereal in 2001 to do the double in the same year.

Being a Kiwi, that made it all so much more special, he said.

Prepared by British duo Simon and Ed Crisford, Without A Fight ran 13th in last year's Melbourne Cup.

Instead of heading home, he went to the Freedman barn and a path was mapped out to have him back in Flemington on Cup day in 2023.