Skip to Content

A Promise of Things to Come

There was no Hucklebuck or Rebel Raider but South Australia took on the Victorian Spring with its typical fighting spirit and, in the end, came away with some good wins and encouragement for the future.

Team SA had to wait until the very last race of the Melbourne Cup Carnival to land perhaps its most impressive winner but Lord Aspen showed in winning the Emirates Airlines Handicap over the Flemington 1400m that he had returned to his brilliant best. Trained at Murray Bridge by Mick Huxtable, the Good Journey five-year-old was ridden a treat by expat South Aussie Dwayne Dunn before ranging up at the 200m to win with real authority.

It was Lord Aspen’s second win at the Carnival in three years, having won in Listed company as a three-year-old on the corresponding day in 2014. The win followed an impressive performance at Morphettville and took his record to eight from 14 after appearing to lose his way last year.

If the Spring threw up a future star for SA racing, it once again came in the three-year-old ranks. Leading trainer Phillip Stokes landed an early coup when Serenely Discreet easily won the Group 1 Edward Manifold Stakes at Flemington. The brilliant Exceed And Excel filly, who made it three wins from five starts in that 1600m feature, had a subsequent setback just when it looked as though she may have been one of the star fillies of the spring.

The Listed Geelong Classic provided another big three-year-old win for Stokes when outsider Captain Duffy led virtually throughout to easily account for a capacity field in the 2200m race and earn a Victoria Derby start. He failed to flatter in the Derby but the run came at the end of a long campaign and he showed enough to suggest he could be a Cups horse next Spring.

Earlier in the spring, Morphettville trainer Gordon Richards would have been expecting big success ahead when Benz won the Moonee Valley Plate on a Friday night meeting in September. The brilliant three-year-old then ran fifth in the Listed Durbridge Stakes back home before returning to Melbourne for a slashing fifth in the Listed Hilton Stakes on Stakes Day. He didn’t collect the big prize but showed enough to suggest he will be a force in the autumn here or interstate.

With bases at Angaston and Flemington, Tony McEvoy had an early collect when promising Hey Doc won at Moonee Valley in early September and a followed a week later when Don’t Doubt Mamma won the Group 2 Let’s Elope Stakes at Flemington. He then produced exciting Snitzel filly Azazel on debut to win the Listed Inglis Banner at Moonee Valley on Cox Plate Day.

Perhaps the biggest SA story to come out of the Spring Carnival was the great form of our home grown riders.

The kid from Streaky Bay, Kerrin McEvoy showed again why he is rated one of the best jockeys in the world when he rode Almandin to perfection to claim his second Melbourne Cup - 16 years after winning aboard Brew. McEvoy won on every day of the Melbourne Cup Carnival and was in sensational form throughout the spring. Top Adelaide rider Dom Tourneur made the most of limited opportunities to steer home The Chairman at Flemington on Oaks Day.

Former leading SA rider Dwayne Dunn picked off winners throughout the Spring Carnival to finish third on the carnival riding premiership but no day was better than Caulfield Guineas Day - when he landed the three-year-old feature on Divine Prophet and followed up one race later by winning the Toorak aboard He’s Our Rokkii. To further illustrate the impact we have on Australian racing, the two Group 1 winners were from the stables carrying the stamp of legendary SA horsemen John Hawkes and David Hayes.

A review of the spring shows just how much SA has contributed to the national racing landscape. Hayes
and Hawkes aside, McEvoy, Michael Moroney, Andrew Noblet and Mark Kavanagh were all spring winners and all either got their starts or made their names in SA.