Queensland harness racing figure Sam Difrancesco is being remembered for his generosity, diligent work ethic and passion for horses following his death last Friday.
He was 90 years of age.
Difrancesco was widely known as ‘Sammy’ during his decades within the harness racing game as he was involved as a driver, trainer, owner and breeder.
He tasted Group 1 glory as well as an array of other feature spoils.
Away from the horses, the respected Difrancesco was a builder by trade and lived at Bracken Ridge in Brisbane’s north.
In his later years in the sport, Difrancesco owned horses with trainer Brian McCall and enjoyed success with Lebron, who won 30 races and claimed more than $250,000 in career stakes.
“He was a really good man,” McCall said of the late Difrancesco.
“He was a really kind and giving man. He was very good with his horses; he always had a good horse and was always looking for fast ones.
“He really looked after his horses well and did a thorough job.
“I knew him for probably 40 years. He originally had horses with my parents and they used to break them all in for him.
“And, together we raced some horses together at the end, but he had some very good horses on his own before that.
“He did have some very, very good horses and a lot of success in his day, Sammy.”
Difrancesco was born in Italy in the 1930s before moving to Australia where he worked on a cane farm at Childers.
It was there where he crossed paths with the Mammino clan and struck up a friendship with Dr John Mammino, who has also been a big-time harness racing owner over the generations.
Dr Mammino recalls Difrancesco being keen to buy a horse in the early days and he travelled to New South Wales to pick up a pacer and it all blossomed from there.
Dr Mammino first met Difrancesco when he was still a teenager.
“I knew him for a long time and he was a very generous person,” Dr Mammino said.
“He had a lot of money and he built houses for people that he knew at a pretty cheap cost, if that is what they needed.
“He would give the shirt off his back to someone; he was that generous.
“He would go out of his way to help anyone.”
In his training days, Difrancesco prepared his team from Bracken Ridge.
Biaggi was his stable superstar across his tenure in the industry while other top performers such as Another Dee, Samar Batman, Cam Dee, Andrels Jay and Cam Left also came through the ranks over the years.
Biaggi won 36 races from a touch over 100 starts and earned almost $300,000 in his career.
At his peak, Biaggi claimed the Group 1 NSW Sires Stakes Final at Harold Park. But, it was the Kevin Seymour Nursery Pace at Albion Park which stood out the most to Difrancesco, according to his son Ross.
“He was very passionate about harness racing,” Ross said.
“I remember one thing he would always say was that he always wanted to win the Seymour Nursery Pace. So, when he did it was one of his biggest thrills.”
Biaggi was eventually sold to the USA.
The late Difrancesco loved his horses, but he was also a devoted family man.
Ross was one of his three children alongside Angelina and Rosemary.
Difrancesco’s beloved wife Mary passed away around five years ago.
“He was a good family man, I couldn’t have found a kinder man,” McCall noted.
While the harness racing records over the years do not date back to Difrancesco’s earliest days in the sport, he did enjoy immense success.
He trained more than 100 winners, drove more than 80, won more than 30 races as a breeder, while in the ownership area, he tallied more than 120 victories. He last drove in a race back in 2009.
Difrancesco had a great strike-rate with his quality team and he would often spend up big at the yearling sales.
Parzival and Lebron were Difrancesco’s last touch points to the industry as an owner through the 2010s.
“His horses always looked magnificent,” McCall said.
“They were conditioned to the minute; they were ready to win. He trained his horses to be fit and hard.
“He loved to train horses and when he was a driver, he drove them in his own way.”
As McCall remarked, Difrancesco had his own unique style when he got into the sulky on raceday.
He was at times known as “three-wide Sammy” for his eager approach to driving.
The late reinsman was always keen to progress to a forward position rather than sit back in the field.
McCall and Dr Mammino knew Difrancesco for much of his life and both commented that he was not afraid to get his hands dirty whether that be with his horses or on a building site.
“He went from cutting cane to being a builder, having his own company and being a successful person just all through hard work,” McCall said.
"That’s how he survived. He became successful because he was a good worker and that was exactly who he was.
"I worked for him a number of times with horses, and there was never anything left undone.
“If there was something to do, we'd get out and do it and he was a great worker.”
Difrancesco’s funeral will be held at St Joseph's Church, Bracken Ridge on Wednesday at 11am.
Racing Queensland extends its condolences to the Difrancesco family.
