All Eyes On Melbourne

ALL EYES ON MELBOURNE 
By Emma Berry 
The 154th G1 Melbourne Cup gained an exciting entrant for the home team after an emphatic victory for Signoff (Ire) (Authorized {Ire}) in the G3 Lexus S. on VRC Derby day at Flemington yesterday. The ‘win-and-you’re-in’ status of the race ensures it garners enormous interest on a day that boasts nine group races, four of which are Group 1s. Derby day it may be, but the last-minute shuffling of the line-up for Tuesday’s Melbourne Cup receives just as much coverage as the top-class fare on offer on the opening day of the Melbourne Cup Carnival. 
Signoff was instantly given a 1kg penalty for the Cup by handicapper Greg Carpenter, meaning he will carry 51kg (112 pounds) in his attempt to emulate Shocking (Aus) (Street Cry {Ire}), the last horse to win the Melbourne Cup after parachuting into the field with a Lexus triumph in 2009. Despite bearing an Irish suffix, Signoff is neither one of an increasing number of international raiders nor an expensive in-training purchase by Australian owners keeping a keen eye on the European form. Trained away from the main metropolitan tracks by Victoria’s leading trainer Darren Weir at Ballarat, he was bred by Darley and offered for sale as a yearling at Tattersalls’ October Sale, where John Foote snapped him up for 75,000gns. The Australian bloodstock agent already has a significant footnote in Melbourne Cup history having bought Tugela (Riverman) for 60,000gns at Tattersalls when carrying the foal that would become three-time winner Makybe Diva (GB) (Desert King {Ire}). 
Signoff will have to fend off the now-traditionally strong challenge from overseas runners towards the top of the betting market, which is headed by the highly impressive G1 Caulfield Cup winner Admire Rakti (Jpn) (Heart’s Cry {Jpn}). Given a plum draw in gate number eight, he will be the first Japanese runner in the Melbourne Cup since 2006, when Delta Blues (Jpn (Dance In The Dark {Jpn}) and Pop Rock (Jpn) (Helissio {Jpn}) provided a Japanese-trained quinella. 
Trainer Johnny Murtagh and owner Andrew Tinkler are doubly represented by Mutual Regard (Ire) (Hernando {Fr}) and Royal Diamond (Ire) (King’s Best), while dual runner-up Red Cadeaux (GB) (Cadeaux Genereux {GB}), Seismos (Ire) (Dalakhani {Ire}), My Ambivalent (Ire) (Authorized {Ire}), Gatewood (GB) (Galileo {Ire}) Cavalryman (GB) (Halling) and Willing Foe (Dynaformer) form a six-pronged attack from Britain. All six are trained in Newmarket by Ed Dunlop, Marco Botti, Roger Varian, John Gosden and Saeed Bin Suroor, respectively. 
Andreas Wohler has twice fielded runners in the Cox Plate–Silvano (Ger) (Lomitas {GB}) and Paolini (Ger) (Lando {Ger})–and the German trainer maintains that the Moonee Valley feature is the Australian race he would most like to win. However, he has an excellent chance in the Melbourne Cup with joint-second favorite Protectionist (Ger), who, like last year’s winner Fiorente (Ire), is a son of the late German champion sire Monsun (Ger). 
Protectionist drew stall 11 at Saturday evening’s barrier draw–the same gate from which his fellow Prix Kergorlay winner Americain (Dynaformer) romped to victory in 2010. The colt will be aided in his quest by Ryan Moore, whose globe-trotting exploits in the last fortnight have seen him win the GI Canadian International aboard Hillstar (GB) (Danehill Dancer {Ire}) and Cox Plate on Adelaide (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}). In a 2013 interview, Moore listed the Kentucky Derby, Melbourne Cup, Japan Cup and Dubai World Cup as the four races in the world he’d most like to win. Later that year he partnered Gentildonna (Jpn) (Deep Impact {Jpn}) to victory in the Japan Cup and it would be no surprise to see him knock the Melbourne Cup off his list on Tuesday. 
With a field of 24 runners he will of course face stiff opposition and is currently locked together in the betting with 4-year-old filly Lucia Valentina (NZ) (Savabeel {NZ}), who was just a length behind Admire Rakti when third in the Caulfield Cup on her last start for Kris Lees. 

A Derby Day to Savour… 
Melbourne may have been beset by heavy rain followed by strong winds on Derby day, but that didn’t deter more than 90,000 people descending on Flemington for an outstanding opener to four days of top-class racing this week. 
“Unmissable” cry the huge billboard posters advertising Flemington’s showcase meeting on the main road bringing visitors from Melbourne’s Tullamarine airport into the city. The Melbourne Cup may be the race everyone’s talking about–and its famous ‘race that stops the nation’ tag needs some broadening now given the huge international interest in the race–but it’s hard to imagine a finer lead-up to Cup day than the racing served up on the first Saturday of the Melbourne Cup Carnival. 
Sydney’s leading trainer Chris Waller proved that he excels in Victoria, too, with a hat-trick of Derby-day wins, including the feature race itself. That came courtesy of the maiden Preferment (NZ), a deserved Classic winner for the now-pensioned Cambridge Stud stalwart Zabeel (NZ), who succeeded his sire Sir Tristram (GB) as one of the greatest staying influences in Australasian racing in the modern era. 
Brazen Beau (Aus) showed Waller is just as adept with sprinters as he is with stayers, taking the G1 Coolmore Stud S. by blazing along the stands’ rail of the Flemington straight to give his exciting young sire I Am Invincible (Aus) his first top-flight winner. Following the G1 Epsom H. victory of He’s Your Man (Fr) (Cape Cross {Ire}) last month, the 3-year-old colt was the second Australian Group 1 winner for Brazilian-born Hong Kong-based riding sensation Joao Moreira, who also won on Signoff and will make his debut appearance in the Melbourne Cup aboard the 5-year-old (by the Southern Hemisphere season) from barrier 16. 
Thunder Lady (NZ) could become the next Classic winner for yet another young stallion whose name has hardly been out of the headlines this year– Mastercraftsman (Ire). With The Grey Gatsby (Ire) and Kingston Hill (GB), both members of his first Northern Hemisphere crop, having already gained Classic honors, the young Coolmore sire now has a filly to advertise his talents in the south after Thunder Lady’s G2 Wakeful S. win rocketed her into contention for Thursday’s G1 Victoria Oaks. Her trainer John Sargent will be hoping history can repeat itself, having completed the Wakeful S.-Oaks double last year with Kirramosa (NZ) (Alamosa {NZ}).