It is often joked that horse racing is a mug's game - but for the fortunate few, a relatively fruitless pursuit outside of the occasional win and the pure love of it.
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And for the better part of 20 years owning race horses, for Tamworth local Craig Wilson, it had been.
But then Ezekeil came along and his luck changed.
And how.
Wilson is still on cloud nine after the Cody Morgan-trained gelding scorched the field to win the $500,000 Magic Millions Country Cup on Saturday.
Amazing, a huge thrill, unbelievable were some of the words he used to described what is "by far" the "best experience" he's had in racing.
"I don't think I've stopped telling people about it," he said.
"I can't believe the ride we've been on so far."
In his early 20s when he brought his first share in a horse, his love of thoroughbreds being passed down from his father, Wilson had before Ezekeil been part of six other horses over the years.
But he had never celebrated a win with any of them.
"So to win multiple races and to win a $500,000 race with Cody being a local and me being a local fellow is just amazing," he said.
He joked that it definitely makes up for the other losses, a share of the $290,000 winning prizemoney pretty fair consolation.
Wilson said the fact that Ekezeil was trained in Tamworth was one of things that appealed to him when he saw the email from Australian Bloodstock, who he had had horses with before, that they had shares available in the gelding. He was also fairly cheap to get into - only "a few thousand dollars".
He was unfortunately unable to get up to the Gold Coast to watch live but cheered the four-year-old home with a few mates at one of the local pubs.
"I was fairly confident beforehand, after he broke the track record at Armidale the previous race, and we'd had some pretty positive updates from Cody," he said.
"And then on the morning of the race they'd had the rain and the confidence levels dropped quite significantly.
"I was sitting there going, I'm glad I didn't go up."
"But then the race just panned out perfectly. Jamie Kah gave him a beautiful ride.
"And once he hit the straight and peeled out off the horse that was leading, it was never in doubt."
Still in shock that he is a part owner of a horse that just won a $500,000 race, Wilson said when he got the audio update after the Armidale win that the Country Cup was the plan, his initial reaction was that they'd sent it to the wrong person.
The celebrations on Saturday night understandably went into the late/early hours, Wilson admitting that Sunday was "a tough day".
He might have to do it all again later in the year with Morgan indicating that the $2million Koscuiszko is the long term target.
"I was pretty excited when I received that update," he said.
"That would be an amazing race to win. I would definitely be going down for that."
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