In a riveting finish, DELTA BLUES (Dance in the Dark) prevailed by a short
head over stablemate Pop Rock (Helissio) to win Tuesday’s Melbourne Cup (Aus-G1)
at Flemington. With more than 100,000 fans on hand for the “race that stops a
nation,” the Japanese runners were given an excellent chance to come away with
the prize, but most expected the favored Pop Rock to come out on top. Instead,
Delta Blues recorded the upset.
Delta Blues and Pop Rock slugged it out stride-for-stride inside the final
furlong while the much-touted Europeans wilted under pressure in their wake. An honest Maybe Better
(Intergaze) represented the home team well by holding gamely for third, 4 1/4
lengths behind the top pair. English invaders Yeats (Ire) (Sadler’s Wells) and Tawqeet
(Kingmambo) entered the event highly regarded, with the pair
vying for favoritsm with Pop Rock, but both wound up faltering in the stretch to
seventh and 19th, respectively.
Trainer
Katsuhiko Sumii and his team had been confident in the past week that they could
run one-two, but few took their claims
seriously, despite the fact that less than a length separated a third-place Delta
Blues and seventh-place Pop Rock in the Caulfield Cup (Aus-G1) on October 21. Sumii is
not new to creating history, sending out Cesario (Jpn) to become first Japanese-trained horse to win a Grade
1 race in North America
with a record-breaking four-length victory in the 2005 American Oaks (G1) at Hollywood
Park last July.
Delta Blues was quickest away from the
barriers and settled one off the lead from runaway leader Zabeat (Rhythm).
When Yeats came three wide and took the lead as the pace quickened at the
850-meter pole, jockey Yasunari Iwata on Delta Blues sat quietly before pouncing with deadly
stealth. Yeats wilted as Pop Rock came out wide to challenge his stablemate and
create an enthralling duel down the vast straight.
“It was very hard to get the
tempo of the race right, I am very disappointed,” said Kieren Fallon, who
partnered Yeats and wore a cashmere sweater under his silks due to the arctic
conditions at Flemington.
Frankie Dettori, who won two Breeders’ Cup races at Churchill Downs on
Saturday, was never a serious factor aboard Geordieland (Johann Quatz [Fr]), who
bled from both nostrils and
finished 18th.
Tawqeet also experienced a rough trip. “I got shuffled right
out of the race going out of the straight the first time, and I had to make a
little bit longer run than we’d thought,” jockey Dwayne Dunn said. “I got close to pouncing and he started
to feel that foot again.”
Maybe
Better pulled up very lame in his offside fore and trainer Brian Mayfield-Smith
said if he recovered properly he would have a light autumn campaign ahead of a
Cup tilt in 2007.
“I am very proud of him, it was all uncharted waters, he’s
never been even anywhere near this distance, and he fought on very courageously,”
the trainer commented.
“(Jockey) Chris Munce said he was fired-up and pulled hard mid-race when the
tempo slacked off, so to come back and do what he has done is terrific.”
Land ‘N Stars (Mtoto)
proved best of the European contingent, finishing fifth.
“To be the first European home, I’m
very proud,” trainer Jamie Poulton said. “It was hard work after the Caulfield Cup. Everyone
had written us off but I knew what my horse was capable of.”
Land ‘N Stars was Poulton’s first Australian runner and he said the experience of bringing a horse
from England to Australia had been a eye-opening but rewarding one.
“It’s been a
learning curve, knowing what to do with them when you travel halfway around the
world,” Poulton said.