Ladbrokes Cox Plate (Group 1)
IN the wake of the Irish-bred and -trained State Of Rest’s tough win in the Ladbrokes Cox Plate last Saturday, both on the track and for 30 minutes in the stewards’ room, attention shifted to whether the MacKinnon Stakes on the final day of the Melbourne Cup Carnival and a race against Zaaki which would see the Starspangledbanner colt sign off on his Melbourne spring.
By mid-week Mark Power reported that Joseph O’Brien had made the decision to head back home with the three-year-old. The second Anamoe is also set for a break.
“He doesn’t need to do any more to be fair to the horse. He ran a huge race and we’re very proud of that performance.”
Reflecting on the effort to get his horses to Australia, Joseph had described the process as a “struggle”, highlighting how disruptive the scanning and the scintigraphy had been.
“To be honest had I known how difficult it would have been to get through all the hoops, I’m not sure we would have even gone down in the first place, but luckily we’ve a great team of people. The vets and Mark Hackett in the office managed to get it over the line but really it was a struggle and I’d like to think that in the years to come they review the protocols they have in place for us each year.”
While Racing Victoria have committed to reviewing that process, it remains to be seen if they choose to apply the same standards to all European horses that arrive in Melbourne for the spring, as they do to those that remain with their northern hemisphere trainers on arrival.
Cox Plate pointer
Keen form and omen students would have narrowed in on State Of Rest’s jockey Johnny Allen in the hours before the Cox Plate.
Just 40 kilometers away, Allen’s fiancée Emma Church saddled up the winner of the benchmark 58 handicap at Yarra Valley.
The winner, Southern Native, is by the 2014 Cox Plate winner Adelaide.
INCENTIVISE is set to start the shortest-priced favourite in Tuesday’s Melbourne Cup since Phar Lap in 1930 who started at 8/11. Solid at $2.30 for the best part of a week, Ladbrokes revealed that Incentivise represents 45% of their betting hold on the race. Having risen 1.5kgs in penalties since weights were released to 57kgs, Cup jockey Brett Prebble is not fazed.
“I don’t think it will be a huge issue for him, I don’t have any problems with the penalty he got,” said Prebble. “He is winning by margins and he is running time. It is a decent task that he will face in the Melbourne Cup, but at the same time he has put his hand up to say he is a very serious horse.”
Incentivise will be over the distance for the first time have been stretched as far as 2,500 metres when winning at Ipswich in June. On the second line of betting is Spanish Mission whose participation is still in doubt after he was found to be lame, Twilight Payment and Verry Elleegant on the third line.