Champion horsemen Hugh Bowman and Chris Waller show their support for Camp Quality

Hugh Bowman and Chris Waller praise the concept of the Golden Eagle supporting charities like Camp Quality.

He’s normally popular with the punters but champion jockey Hugh Bowman was king of the kids at Rosehill on Tuesday.

Bowman and leading trainer Chris Waller were putting smiles on the faces of kids who have been doing it tough and one of Sydney’s newest and most popular races played a big part.

The connections of the Golden Eagle runners nominate a charity before the race each year and 10 per cent of prizemoney earned goes to their selected organisation.

Bowman rode I’m Thunderstruck to victory last year in the $7.5 million race and Camp Quality was the lucky charity to receive $410,000 of his $4.1 million first prize for taking out the race.

“It’s a great incentive and it’s great to see the kids and the joy this charity brings to their faces,” Bowman said.

“The Golden Eagle races for huge prizemoney and it’s wonderful to see something given back to the community and what better charity to be supportive of than one that caters for young, sick children.

“It was good to walk around the track with the kids. Giving a percentage of the Golden Eagle prizemoney to charity is a great feeling.”

And it will only get bigger this year as the Golden Eagle’s prizemoney goes up to $10 million so charities will get even more in 2022.

Waller said it was a good example of what racing does for the community.

“A million dollars is going to be given to charity this year,” he said.

“The Golden Eagle is a race for the west which is where I’m from. We’ll be hoping to have two or three runners in the race this year.”

The Golden Eagle will be run at Rosehill on October 29.

Matt Jones