Best Australian Racing Stories (38 page)

The racing public loved the little mare and sent her out at 10 to 9 for her final victory in the Sandown Cup, carrying 9 st (57 kg) on a bog track. Light Fingers's record overall was 33 starts for 15 wins, eight seconds and five thirds.

It was to be another 23 years before a female would win another Melbourne Cup, but mares won two out of four Cups between 1988 and 1991—who could forget those two mighty chestnuts, Empire Rose and Let's Elope?

Although bred on different lines, Empire Rose and Let's Elope were similar in many ways. Both were bred and owned in New Zealand, both were huge chestnut mares (Empire Rose only just fitted in the barrier stalls and Let's Elope was not much smaller), and both were mighty tough stayers.

Empire Rose was by the great Sir Tristram out of a Sovereign Edition mare and won good races on both sides of the Tasman, including the New Zealand Cup and Trentham Stakes in New Zealand, and Australia's Mackinnon and Melbourne Cup of 1988.

Her record in the Melbourne Cup is getting towards the ‘Shadow King' level. She started four times in the great race for a fifth in 1986, a second in 1987, a win in 1988, and a final unplaced run as a seven-year-old, behind Tawriffic, in 1989.

Although her overall record of nine wins and eight placings from 48 starts is not equal to that of some other great staying mares, Laurie Laxon's efforts to condition the huge mare to win major races and race on well into her seven-year-old season is remarkable. He was helped in his training by wife Sheila, who rode Empire Rose in her trackwork and would later become the first female trainer to win a Melbourne Cup, appropriately with a mare.

Having watched the huge chestnut mare go around in four Melbourne Cups, the racing public could have been forgiven for thinking she had returned, in different racing colours, two years after her final run in 1989, when Let's Elope took out the Cup.

Let's Elope was by the American stallion Nassipour out of a New Zealand-bred mare by the good English sire Battle-Waggon. In spite of the multinational nature of her pedigree, a look at her breeding confirms that she had three crosses to Nearco, two via Nasrullah and one via Dante, and also had Bois Roussel on her sire side, which means she had an abundance of Carbine blood.

Let's Elope did not start at two, but showed some promise at three while racing in New Zealand. She won her first start and then struggled to win again until taking out a Group 3 event and being sold. Her new owners transferred her to Bart Cummings in Australia, and the ‘Cups King' conditioned her for a spring campaign in Melbourne, in 1991, as a four-year-old.

Although she was a duffer in the wet, she showed good staying ability in her first three starts for Bart. Then the weather cleared and the mighty mare went on a winning rampage.

Let's Elope won four races in a row in the spring: the Turn-bull Stakes, the Mackinnon and the Melbourne–Caulfield Cups double—the first mare since Rivette to do so.

She then returned in the autumn to win three in a row: the Orr Stakes, St George Stakes and Australian Cup.

Injury and controversy plagued Let's Elope for the rest of her career. A damaged fetlock kept her out of racing until she returned to defeat the champion Better Loosen Up in a match race at five. She was then relegated from close second to fifth for causing interference to that same horse in the 1992 WS Cox Plate, won by Super Impose.

She bled in the Japan Cup and again while racing in the USA, where she was twice first past the post but was again relegated for interference, this time from first to third in a Group 1 race.

The second bleeding attack and a fractured cannon bone forced her into retirement in 1993. She produced the good stayer Ustinov from a mating to Seeking The Gold but, despite her matings with the best US sires, her other progeny did not do well on the track.

In 1998 another two great New Zealand mares fought out a memorable Melbourne Cup finish when Jezabeel, winner of the Auckland Cup and a daughter of that great producer of stayers, Sir Tristram's son Zabeel, defeated another daughter of Zabeel, Champagne, in an unforgettable finish.

Jezabeel was typical of the dour Zabeel offspring who took time to mature and race into condition; she won seven of her 26 starts and was placed another five times.

Jezabeel had Northern Dancer blood via her sire's dam, Lady Giselle, and Nasrullah on her dam side, so she fits the ‘Cup-winning' pattern of Carbine blood on both sides.

Having helped husband Laurie to win the Cup with Empire Rose in 1988, Sheila Laxon returned in triumph as a trainer in her own right to take the Cups double with Ethereal in 2001.

Owned and bred by the Vela brothers at Pencarrow Stud, Ethereal was sired by US Breeders' Cup winner, Rhythm, the champion US two-year-old of 1989 and a son of the hugely influential sire Mr Prospector. Completing Ethereal's multinational pedigree was her dam, Romanee Conti, a Hong Kong Cup winner and daughter of Sir Tristram, who carried both Wilkes and Le Filou blood on her dam side.

With a pedigree made to order for a stayer with a turn of foot, Ethereal proved to be just that. She took out four classic races at Group 1 level in winning the Caulfield–Melbourne Cups double, the Queensland Oaks and the Tancred Stakes (now the BMW).

At stud Ethereal produced the handy filly Uberalles, from a mating to Giant's Causeway. Uberalles won at Group 2 level and was third in the New Zealand Derby. Ethereal's other progeny have sold for huge prices, with a colt by Stravinsky fetching $1.3 million at the Karaka sales, but have not excelled as yet on the track.

Two years after Ethereal's Cups double, the history of ‘mares and the Melbourne Cup' was to be changed forever when Makybe Diva won the first of her three.

But what of mares who never won the Melbourne Cup? How do Wakeful, Carlita, Desert Gold, Tranquil Star, Flight, Chiquita, Leilani, Surround, Emancipation and Sunline compare to those who did?

Surround, Emancipation and Sunline were great champions, but they were not true stayers, although Surround looked like having the potential to be a great stayer at three. She won the VRC Oaks and Queensland Oaks, but failed in the Brisbane Cup at 3200 metres. After an amazing three-year-old season, in which she started 16 times for 12 wins, she was retired at four, the age at which Makybe Diva won her first race.

Emancipation, for all her brilliance and toughness up to a mile, failed to run beyond 2000 metres. Her tally of Group 1 wins— seven—equals The Diva's, but she was certainly no stayer.

Sunline won almost twice as many times as The Diva at Group 1 level, but she was powerful only over the shorter distances—the longest distance at which she ever competed was 2040 metres— and she was never a candidate for a 2-mile Cup.

Carlita won the VRC Derby and Oaks as well as the Rosehill Guineas and the Craven Plate, and the Kings Plate at weight for age by a massive 25 lengths. She ran third in the Cup of 1915 carrying 8 st 5 lb (53 kg), and sixth—with 9 st 5 lb (59.5 kg), behind Sasanof who was carrying only 6 st 12 lb (43.5 kg)—in 1916.

Desert Gold also raced in World War I and won 19 races in a row. She won 36 times from 59 starts and carried top weight of 9 st 6 lb (60 kg) to finish eighth in the Cup of 1918. It was one of only six unplaced runs in her 59-start career.

Tranquil Star was tough as old boots, starting 111 times and winning two WS Cox Plates, three Mackinnons, and the St George Stakes, Caulfield Stakes, Lloyd Stakes and so on. She carried a record-winning weight for a mare to take out the Caulfield Cup with 8 st 12 lb (56 kg) in 1942, and then carried a whopping 9 st 3 lb (58.5 kg) to run 12th on a bog track behind Colonus, carrying 7 st 2 lb (45 kg), in the Melbourne Cup that year. She even raced on successfully after recovering from breaking her jaw, winning a Memsie Stakes, a William Reid Stakes and her third Mackinnon!

Flight never started in a Melbourne Cup, but could stay. She won the WS Cox Plate, Mackinnon, AJC Oaks, Colin Stephen Stakes and Champagne Stakes, and ran third in a Sydney Cup. At middle distance she was often up against Bernborough, but still ended her career with a respectable record of 24 wins and 28 other placings from 65 starts. Although she was a grand-daughter of Heroic, she was famously bought for just 60 guineas and won more than a thousand times her purchase price in wartime when prize money was very low. Her daughter, appropriately named Flight's Daughter, produced Derby winners Skyline and Sky High, who established a bloodline of world significance when standing at stud in the USA.

The bonny black mare Chiquita won 11 times at three, including the Manifold Stakes, Thousand Guineas,Wakeful Stakes and The VRC Oaks. She found one better in the Jim Cummings-trained Comic Court, however, who defeated her often, including in the Mackinnon Stakes and Melbourne Cup of 1950, where she ran second both times; she also ran second in the Caulfield Cup behind Grey Boots. She had the satisfaction of one win over Comic Court in the Craiglee Stakes over a mile, and their daughter, Comicquita, ran second to Even Stevens in the 1962 Melbourne Cup.

Leilani was a great staying mare, winning six times at Group 1 level in a relatively short career. Her 14 wins, six seconds and six thirds from 28 starts is a great record for a stayer, and her wins included the AJC Oaks, Caulfield Cup, Toorak Handicap, and the Mackinnon, St George, CF Orr and Turnbull Stakes. Bart Cummings's decision not to start her in the Cup with 59 kg means we will never know if she could have been up there with the great mares who won it.

For my money it comes down to Wakeful and Makybe Diva as the two greatest staying mares in our racing history.

Both mares started racing late and missed the classic fillies races for different reasons. Wakeful was amazingly versatile and won the sprint double of the Oakleigh Plate and Newmarket early in her career, at four. Makybe Diva, on the other hand, having never won first-up and never won a race under a mile in distance, came out at seven and won the Memsie Stakes first-up over 1400 metres.

Wakeful won over 4800 metres, a feat not possible in Makybe Diva's day. She also won ten races that would be Group 1 today, compared to Makybe Diva's seven. On the other hand, she started twice in the Melbourne Cup and never won; Makybe Diva won three. Makybe raced a century after Wakeful and much had changed in that time; she never carried the weights Wakeful had to, and her record overall does not match that of Wakeful.

So, it all depends how you look at it and which facts and figures you want to use. The greatest staying mare to ever compete in the Melbourne Cup? Maybe it was Wakeful, or maybe it was Makybe. The greatest mare to win the Cup? Well, history says that it's Makybe Diva . . . and maybe she always will be.

PART 4
The Good Old Days

Azzalin the Dazzlin' Romano

DAVID HICKIE

ASK ANY OLD-TIME RACEGOER
the ownership of the prominent silks ‘orange, purple sleeves and black cap' and you'll find most would know them as the colours of Pioneer Concrete boss Sir Tristan Antico.

Ask about their history before that and a few will remember them as the colours carried to fame by the mid 1940s champion Bernborough. It is surprising, however, how few recall their ownership by one of the most colourful characters of Sydney in the 1930s, 40s and 50s—Azzalin Orlando Romano.

Romano, known around town as Azzalin the Dazzlin', was a leading figure in what passed for Sydney's smart set between the wars. His ritzy restaurant, Romano's, had a reputation as the swishest eatery in the city.

Romano's was
the
scene on New Year's Eve and, with the other upmarket restaurant Prince's—run by another horse owner, Jim Bendrodt, in Martin Place—Romano's prided itself as a rendezvous point where the young movers and shakers of the era dined to be seen and preferably photographed for the social pages.

Romano opened his original Romano's cafe at 105 York Street in 1927. In 1938 he acquired additional premises in Castlereagh Street, next to the Prince Edward Theatre and opposite the Hotel Australia, and began Romano's restaurant. He installed an air-conditioning plant, lighting and furnishings, which alone cost £40,000, a tremendous sum in those days.

Things moved slowly for a year or two, but then the war began, bringing a floating population and, of course, the Americans, who guaranteed boom times for restaurants. During the war years, when the restaurant-turned-nightclub became a favourite haunt of American servicemen, everyone stood to attention just before closing time for the playing of the
Star Spangled Banner
and
God Save the King.

Romano's prospects looked decidedly dim at one point during the boom when the club was declared ‘out of bounds' to American servicemen. An Australian publican-punter had flattened an American officer, who had made advances to his girlfriend, by smashing a champagne bottle over the officer's head. But the matter was quickly and discretely resolved, and the ban lifted within a matter of weeks. In the interim Romano's waiters and doormen had merely advised enquiring GIs where to borrow civilian clothes and then ushered them in anyway.

Romano had invested in a farm at Baulkham Hills, northwest of Sydney, to supply his restaurant with vegetables, poultry and pig meat. He kept 6000 fowls on the property. Romano took particular delight in always reminding important visitors and the press, ‘I am the pioneer of the first-class restaurant in Australia.'

A magazine of the era summed up:

Romano's is the nightclub where Sydney's theatre and hotel crowds converge at all hours of the day or night. Romano's restaurant is as spectacular as its owner, a bewildering array of mirrors, blond wood furniture, upholstery in colour something between maroon and burnt orange, concealed lights and high-class dance bands. It is social and near social, expensive and extravagant, the venue of the great and the near great and the would-be great.

The
Sydney Sun
newspaper once noted, ‘It became a kind of training ground for generations of Sydney's better-off youngsters.'