MARBLE BAR RACES ‘UNDIES RUN’ HISTORY

Ngaarda Media attended the Roebourne races, Marble Bar Cup over the weekend and spoke with East Pilbara residents about the day.

Ngaarda Media’s Tangiora Hinaki spoke to Chrissie McDowell, a former resident of Port Hedland about her late husband’s envolvement in the Mixed Breed Clothing Optional Undies Run.

The Mixed Breed Clothing Optional Undies Run by Kelly Bell

In 2013, I moved to Port Hedland to work for the North West Telegraph as a journo, a subsidiary of The West Australian Regional Newspaper group. An experience that would be lifechanging in so many ways, but would shape an event that has become, a part of the colour and shapes of the Pilbara. The first weekend of July, I went to Marble Bar to cover the annual race day and ball. But you see, things were different that year, because it was the 120th anniversary of the race ball. The theme suitably was 1890s and the Yarrie crew had ordered in big hooped dresses from the states. Pastoralist Annebelle Coppin was decked out in a red ball gown. She decided, as clerk of the course the next day, that she'd don the same gown for the role. The white frills of her underskirt stark against the red earth of the track. And well, anyone who knows anything about Marble Bar Races, knows there has been a streaker, as long as anyone can remember. The same streaker had done the job for a few years now but something had changed between 2012 and 2013.

He got married/had a kid, and his partner demanded he man up as a family man. No streaking for him. So around swings the final race and we realise there is no streaker. And well, it's tradition. So we convince remote area fencer Shane, to chase Belle down the home straight. Her red dress billows as she fiends fear at the naked man chasing her. The punishment for streaking was being kicked out. And the local constables, knowing the drill were waiting for Shane at the final post. Tradition upheld we went on our merry way. For a long time, the antics at Marble Bar has been printed in the local papers and The West. That Sunday, after securing a suitably brilliant picture from ABC North West journo, Stephen Stockwell, I rushed back to Hedland to file the copy for the Monday edition of The West.

Having blurred Shane's family jewels, I got on with the weekly newspaper and the stations went back to mustering. Unbeknownst to us, a big wig in an ivory tower in Perth, read that edition of The West and called up Marble Bar police, who I knew, and demanded to know what had happened to the streaker. Why, he'd been kicked out. But old mate big wig, decided that an example needed to be made, and demanded they charge Shane. And so began the saga of the remote area fencer, the QC from Perth, who donated his time out of sheer hatred for the stupidity of the Perth cops, the journos siphoned to give evidence, the 50 year race club president and the court case that cost the cops tens of thousands and lasted 11 months.

We all fronted up to South Hedland Courthouse one fateful afternoon for the case to be heard before the local Magistrate, who just happened to be on the hill, beer in hand, watching the streaker that fateful day. What eventuated was a level of hilarity, I wish was filmed. The race club president, declared he ain't swearing on the bible cos he was going to hell, and when questioned by the police prosecutor about the streaker, explained they'd been a streaker as long as he remembered and he'd been involved for 50 years and his dad before him, and well "sometimes there are two and sometimes, they take a ride in the chopper from the middle of the track". The police lost. Costs were awarded against the State. But we were left with a pickle. The Marble Bar Races was only weeks away, and we knew the ivory tower would be watching. So the Marble Bar sergeant, Shane, some station boys and I came up with the plan for the Mixed Breed, Clothing Optional Undies Run, which would be clearly marked on the race guide and announced prior to its occurrence so as to allow any sensitive types to avert their eyes. Shane organised a bottle of spirits for the male winner and the female got a bottle of Moet.

Race day swings around and the boys had been teasing me for a year that it was my fault Shane had ended up in court. So punishment was, taking part in the undies run! And so I stripped to my black Bonds undies and black bra and I jumped the white fence to join Shane, the Yarrie boys and the oldest Brooks son on the track. My job was to start the race. Seeing me out there, a couple of the other girls jumped the fence too. And with a level of laughter rolling through the crowd, we took off down the home straight. I won the bottle of Moet (out of sympathy I reckon) and drunk it warm from the bottle with the crew on the bus back into town. The next year swings around, and I happened to be named Belle of the Ball with local legend, and the best mutering pilot in The West, Rossy Rotor (Ross McDowell) being named Beau of the Ball.

The deal was, you wore your sashes to the racecourse the next day. As Rossy demanded we find the visiting photographers for more photos, he turned to me and declared that the next year, he'd give us younguns a run for our money in the Undies Race. Little did we know, that would be the last Marble Bar weekend with Rossy. He died a few weeks later in a devastating chopper crash. Ripping out the heart of the Pilbara. And so, in 2015, myself and my dear friends, formed Rossy Rotor Rooters, and I made us all costumes and we jumped that white fence and I started, another, bigger crowd, who ran that final 100m for Rotor. At the end, we traced back through the crowd and find Chrissie, and explained how, in dropping our pants and running care free along the final 100m we were honoring the spirit of the great man. Each year had another costume inspired by Rossy. Usually, hand painted as I flew from Perth to Hedland. In the midst of the past few years, after suffering a devastating spinal injury, the race became my beacon of hope. Organising the crew to front up on the first Saturday in July for Rossy.

Even when I couldn't run. I skip down that 100m with Sister Joanie Foley in her elaborate costumes. We've convinced many a soul to join us over the years and the event has gotten bigger and bigger. I was the starter until 2019. 2020 was canceled by COVID. And 2021, the crew ran in the carpark of the race course and sent it to me after we couldn't leave Perth lockdown to attend. Somewhere in 2019, the Shire or race club tried to commercialise the Undies Run by selling it out to Iron Jack. But little did they know, or attempt to understand the meaning behind it. The whole point is to feel the freedom of having 3000 people cheer you on as you embrace life, as you live in the moment, as we remember our Rossy, who did just that.