After a three-year love affair with Makybe Diva, a mare as Australian as Kylie and Dame Edna, the Melbourne crowd had begun to believe that their Cup would never leave home again. Even the most parochial of them, however, must acknowledge the momentous impact of a race that proved them all wrong.
It was not, after all, the heavily touted European contenders who hijacked the most spectacular race in the southern hemisphere yesterday. None of them made the frame. Instead, the finish was dominated by the two challengers bred and trained in Japan, Delta Blues repelling Pop Rock, his stable companion, by a shrinking short head.
The result will have profound significance, both for future Melbourne Cups and for international racing worldwide. Though the exploits of Deep Impact and Heart’s Cry have been earning global respect for Japan’s burgeoning bloodstock industry, yesterday’s monopoly of a race that they had begun to contemplate only a year ago was ground-breaking glory.
Five weeks ago, Deep Impact commanded a fan club of 6,000 and a media entourage of hundreds as he ran third in the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe, a placing he was to lose after a failed drug test. Yesterday, with lower profile and far less expectation, Delta Blues became an icon for his nation.
To the disbelief of a 106,000 crowd, shivering in wintry winds, even the consolation of victory for a local jockey was denied. Damien Oliver, triumphant on Media Puzzle when the Cup last left Australasia four years ago, looked sure to snatch the prize as Pop Rock closed menacingly in the final 100 yards.
Somehow, the longer-priced Delta Blues, having led from the three-furlong pole, held on tenaciously. In the saddle, Yasunari Iwata looked to Oliver for confirmation, grasped his outstretched hand and broke down in tears.
Iwata has ridden more than 3,000 winners in his homeland but had never previously ventured outside Japan. Arriving here only on Monday, he had little time to acclimatise, yet he rode Delta Blues with strength and fine judgment.
Neither Iwata nor the bespectacled Katsuhiko Sumii speak English but no interpreter was needed to gauge the depth of their feelings. On the winner’s rostrum, Sumii, who trained both first and second, thanked Australia “for giving us a chance”. Some Australians may now be wishing they had not been so accommodating, for this will be just the start of an annual Japanese assault.
Delta Blues had been locally ridden when a staying-on third in the Caulfield Cup last month. Tawqeet, who won that race, went off joint-favourite with Pop Rock yesterday but was never out of the tailenders and may have been suffering from a nail that pierced his hoof when he spread a plate on Monday.
Angus Gold, racing manager for Tawqeet’s owner, Sheikh Hamdan, explained the late scare. “When you’ve got the favourite for the Melbourne Cup, it’s a tough call, but he wasn’t lame and it was not enough to take him out of the race. It’s too early to say if it was troubling him but we know he’s better than that.”
There was a more evident excuse for a similarly tepid run by the leading British contender, Geordieland. Jamie Osborne, his trainer, had been so bullish that he was preparing to give up smoking if he won, and Frankie Dettori had sweated down to his lightest to ride the grey. Both looked deflated when Dettori returned to report a broken blood vessel.
When Yeats, winner of Cup races at Ascot and Goodwood and now a first Melbourne Cup runner for the Ballydoyle team of Aidan O’Brien, turned for home travelling strongly in front under Kieren Fallon, a third Irish winner looked possible.
Fallon, though, was not riding the race as he had planned. “I wasn’t comfortable,” he said. “At Ascot, I was never going to get beaten on him but that was a different tempo altogether. Here, they kick from the gate, then just sit through the middle part of the race. When they kick again, they can swamp you for speed, make you look silly.”
Yeats could only stay on at the one pace for seventh. With Glistening undermined by his draw in stall 24, it was the 200-1 chance, Land ’N Stars, who upheld the honour of the European contingent, claiming fifth place for his trainer, Jamie Poulton.
With his stocky build and long hair, not to mention his part-time pursuit as a disc jockey, there is more of Meat Loaf than Sir Michael Stoute to the flamboyant Poulton. Yesterday, sporting a Cross of St George on his tie, he was rightly proud. It was a big day for his 22-box yard on the Sussex Downs. But an even bigger one for the racing juggernaut that is Japan.
BIG-RACE RESULT
4.00 EMIRATES MELBOURNE CUP
(Group I: handicap: £1,276,596: 2m)
1, DELTA BLUES Y Iwata (17-1)
2, Pop RockD M Oliver (5-1 jt-fav)
3, Maybe BetterC Munce (9-1)
4, ZippingG Boss (9-1)
ALSO RAN: Land ’N Stars (5th), Mahtoum (6th), Yeats (7th), Activation (8th), Mandela (9th), Glistening (10th), Kerry O’Reilly, Railings, Headturner, Short Pause, Dolphin Jo, Art Success, Dizelle, Geordieland, Tawqeet, On A Jeune, Demerger, Ice Chariot, Zabeat. 23 ran. NR: Efficient. Sh hd, 4½l, 1½l, 1½l, sh nk, nk. K Sumii in Japan. Tote (including A$1 stake): 17.50; 5.60, 2.10, 3.90.
DF: 41.30. SF: 91.80.
- Land ’N Stars, trained by Jamie Poulton, is likely to remain in Australia to be prepared for the Perth Cup, run on New Year’s Day.
