EMIRATES MELBOURNE CUP

CONSIDERED one of the deepest ever Melbourne Cup fields in terms of quality by chief handicapper Greg Carpenter, the 100/1 outsider Prince Of Penzance stunned his rivals in Tuesday’s Emirates Melbourne Cup following a near perfect ride from Michelle Payne for Melbourne’s leading trainer of the past two years Darren Weir.

The Willie Mullins-trained Max Dynamite ran on in strong fashion to claim second as the David Hayes and Tom Dabernig-trained Criterion maintained his high level of international performances to take third.

With no pace in the opening stanza, Big Orange had the luxury of ambling forward from gate 23 to take up the running as the field passed the post the first time. Tellingly the three eventual place getters, who had jumped from barriers 1, 2 and 4, were all on the rail trailing each other as they sat behind Quest For More who had crossed from gate 21 to the sit on the rail behind Big Orange.

Along the riverside, Jamie Spencer eased the tempo swinging the advantage to those in the first half of the field - shades of Green Moon in 2012.

With the field stacking up approaching the home turn, Michelle Payne left the rail to get onto the outside of Max Dynamite and into the train of Trip To Paris. As the latter sprinted out of the straight to challenge for the lead, Payne ‘shut the gate’ on Max Dynamite.

With no runs on the inside this forced Frankie Dettori on Max Dynamite to go back and around Prince Of Penzance setting off a chain of interference that affected Gust Of Wind, Hokko Brave, Grand Marshall, Preferment and Kingfisher. It was as good as check-mate by Michelle Payne as Prince Of Penzance accelerated to be a length and a half clear of Max Dynamite at the clock tower.

Hitting the front and holding his advantage, Prince Of Penzance won by a half-length from Max Dynamite with Criterion three-quarters of a length further back in third.

The first three across the line all broke 23 seconds for the final 400 metres, as the overall time was a pedestrian seven seconds outside the race record. Trip To Paris was fourth ahead of Big Orange and Gust Of Wind, the latter the only horse to make ground from the tail. Quest For More ran ninth, the Japanese pair of the race-favourite Fame Game and Hokko Brave were 13th and 17th. Aidan O’Brien’s duo, Bondi Beach and Kingfisher were 16th and 19th, the Godolphin-trained Sky Hunter was 22nd with last across the line being Snow Sky who copped a bad check in the straight and was eased down. Frankie Dettori was suspended for a month and fined A$20,000 for careless riding whilst Jamie Spencer was also suspended, getting 14 days for Big Orange rolling in and checking Our Ivanhowe in the straight.

FEMALE JOCKEY

A second ride in the Melbourne Cup (her first was in 2009) for Michelle Payne produced the first win for a female jockey. “I can’t believe,” said Payne. “I’m so glad I could do the job for them, not only for Darren and all the owners and his team, but for female jockeys in particular. To think that Darren Weir has given me a go when it’s such a chauvinistic sport. I know some of the owners were keen to kick me off ‘Prince’ and John Richards and Darren (both owners) stuck really solid with me. I put in all the effort, I galloped him every gallop he had and did everything I could to stay on him because I thought he had what it takes to run a race in the Melbourne Cup. I just can’t say how grateful I am to them. I just want to say to everyone else they can ‘get stuffed’ because they think women aren’t strong enough, but we just beat the world.”