Maldivian, brilliant first-up winner of the Group 1 Orr Stakes (1400m) at Caulfield almost two weeks ago, will not race again this autumn.

Flemington trainer Mark Kavanagh said today he had found swelling in the giant gelding’s near side front suspensory.

“We had the leg scanned immediately and it showed a small tear,” Kavanagh said in a press release. “We caught it all early. The injury is of minor significance. Maldivian will be rested immediately and set for the spring.”

Maldivian (B g 6, Zabeel (NZ)-Shynzi (USA), by Danzig (USA)) was to have raced in the Group 2 St George Stakes (1800m) at Caulfield on Saturday and go on to the Group 1 Australian Cup (2000m) at Flemington on Super Saturday, March 7.

The Cox Plate winner, one of the biggest horses racing in Victoria, is no stranger to mishap – he was scratched at the barrier when hot favourite for the 2007 Caulfield Cup, his neck a bloody mess after he reared and cut it on a camera mount above his gate; and his 2008 autumn campaign was aborted after the St George (his third start of that preparation) because of a hairline fracture of the knee.

He returned for last spring and triumphed, when supposedly out of form after six winless runs, in the Group 1 Cox Plate (2040m) at Moonee Valley after Kavanagh pulled a rabbit (or two) from the hat – the trainer schooled Maldivian over a couple of jumps and put blinkers on, a ploy often used on Zabeel progeny.

In praise of his boss’s magician-like transformation of Maldivian’s form, track rider Mike Preston bought Kavanagh a rabbit in a hat – a stuffed toy in a bush hat that sits on a desk in the office at the stables.

The magic has run out, for now. It is to be hoped such a big horse – his racing weight is in the high 580kgs and he usually returns from a spell at 600kg-plus – can put his full weight on the leg in fast work next spring.

Maldivian has three Group 1 wins, the other the 2007 Yalumba Stakes (2000m) at Caulfield. His race record is 27 starts for nine wins and 10 placings, and he has earned almost $2.8 million for West Australian owner Joe Ricciardo.

Exciting colt Wilander, a close relation of our Bel Esprit filly, has been primed to win Saturday’s Group 1 Sportingbet Oakleigh Plate (1100m) at Caulfield. He has drawn barrier 10 and will be ridden by Kerrin McEvoy.

A win for Wilander at Group 1 level not only will assure the handsome chestnut of a commercial stud career at Darley, but also significantly boost the value of our Bel Esprit filly.

Wilander’s dam Scandinavia (mare by Snippets from Song Of Norway) and Song Of The Sun (Desert Sun-Song Of Norway), the dam of the Bel Esprit filly, are half-sisters.

Wilander’s family has been building to a win in the Oakleigh Plate. His dam Scandinavia had two starts in the Oakleigh Plate for a seventh in 1998 (won by Singing The Blues) and eighth in 1999 (Dantelah). Wilander’s half-brother Magnus (Flying Spur-Scandinavia) also had two runs in the Oakleigh Plate and fared better than his dam – he was second last year behind the champion Weekend Hussler, and third in 2007 behind Undue and Poet’s Voice. Magnus stands at stud at Eliza Park, Kerrie.

Trainer Lee Freedman set Wilander for this race after he won the Group 2 Schillaci Stakes (1000m) at Caulfield in the spring. Freedman believes the handicap conditions, and the 1100m around turn are ideal for the colt, who resumed with a close (dead-heat) fourth with Weekend Hussler behind Scenic Blast in the Group 1 Lightning Stakes (WFA 1000m) at Flemington. Wilander drops from 55kg to 52.5kg, and meets Scenic Blast on 1kg better terms.

The Thoroughbred Magazine Club’s Bel Esprit-Song Of The Sun filly has almost completed her pre-training at Eliza Park, under the care of astute trainer Sue Ellis.

The filly has been doing trot and canter work, leading into running even time (15 secs to the furlong – or a bit slower than ¾ pace) when she gets to Cranbourne under the care of trainer Robbie Griffiths.

Ellis is impressed by how much the filly has filled out and matured in her Christmas break.

If all goes well, the filly should be ready to trial at Cranbourne in around six weeks time – early April.

Trainer Robbie Griffiths is excited by the prospects of the Bel Esprit-Song Of The Sun filly after completing her first preparation at Cranbourne in the spring.

“I gave her a gallop at Cranbourne over 600m, and she stunned me when she ran around 36 secs. It was a very fast time for her first serious hit out, in her first preparation,” he said.

“For a tall, leggy filly who should be able to get over a bit of ground, I was surprised by how much speed she showed. She has a good action and she covers a lot of ground in her stride.”

I think we have a lot to look forward to. 

Bart Cummings might live in Sydney, but he was at home in Melbourne on Tuesday night as he entertained a full house at Champions, the Australian Racing Museum at Federation Square.

They paid up to $45 to hear the Cups King talk and they got outstanding value for their money, although Bart’s preliminaries, when he was short with media trying to make the most of him bringing along his 12^th miniature cup to put alongside the 11 already on display in the museum, indicated that MC Bryan Martin would have his work cut out getting more than glib one-liners from an apparently shy man, whose brief and sassy answers increasingly have become his stock in trade.

With prompting and more than a little memory jogging, 81-year-old Cummings gave just enough away to make a lie of an  old comment recalled by one listener that “Bart makes every pound a prisoner”. And more than enough to satisfy all the audience, there because they admire Bart immensely for what he has achieved in racing; and not only for his achievements in the Cup, in which he has had 78 runners in 40 cups.

Age has slowed him and shrunk him a touch, but he is still quick enough and his already huge stature in the sport has been increased with his most recent remarkable achievement – the unlikely win of Viewed in the 2008 Cup.

Martin led Cummings on a meandering journey through a lifetime in racing, that touched on the following:

His father, Jim, the trainer of 1950 Melbourne Cup winner Comic Court, was a patient and dedicated man who said his prayers every night and “didn’t put up with fools”.

Another great trainer of stayers, George Hanlon, then working for an Adelaide bakery, would spend three hours a day talking to Jim Cummings at Cummings’ Glenelg stables. “He learnt a lot from Dad. I couldn’t figure out why he was there. Now I know.”

When 11, Bart nearly drowned when swimming at Glenelg. “The barber’s son was a better swimmer than me,” Cummings recalled. “He said, ‘What are you doing?’ I’m going down … I think his name was O’Grady, from memory.”  Told by Martin that the saviour won a bravery award, Cummings quipped, “Did he? Waste of time, that was.”

Minding the stable for his father, whose holiday in Ireland extended from a month to several months, Bart was told by the South Australian Jockey Club that he had to take out a trainer’s licence. “I was forced into the position I am now, which is terrible.” July this year will be the marker on a 56-year career, and training fees have gone from “two pound 10 a week” ($5) to $700-plus.

When his first Cup runner Asian Court (12^th in 1958) won the Werribee Cup, a punter who had copped a tip from Cummings gave him a “bundle”. Bart was with another old trainer known for his punting prowess, Tommy Hughes. He asked Hughes whether he should tell the owner about the sling. The reply from Hughes? “No, shut up, you mug.”

Cummings finds it hard to believe just how good his father’s Cup winner, Comic Court (1950), was. Bart, who strapped the horse, recalls the first start after the two-mile Cup, in the 1200m William Reid Stakes at Moonee Valley (now called the Australia Stakes and won this month by Apache Cat). Ridden by Jack Purtell, Comic Court was last at the top of the short straight, but quickly ran past the whole field to win in record time.

Bart’s own Cup winners were “different horses, different colours, different prices, different owners”, but winning was in the trainer’s eye. “What your eye tells you is the way you should go,” was his attitude to preparing each. Light Fingers, who beat stablemate Ziema by a lip in 1965, did not need the same hard work as the runner-up. “The other horse was thoroughly fit,” Cummmings said. “She was a bit better. My brother (Pat, a big punter) put a lot of money on (Ziema).”

Suggesting that those who had given him awards inside and outside racing were good judges, Cummings said: “I just do my job. I’ve been lucky and I’ve succeeded.”

Bart bought Galilee (the 1966 Melbourne Cup winner) “for 3200 guineas, from memory” because the young horse’s front legs were turned in. “(Rival trainer) Tommy Smith told me, “Bart, you bought a bloody cripple,’” Cummings said, mimicking Smith’s squeaky voice. “After it won the Sydney Cup I said, ‘That bloody cripple’s going all right, Tommy,’.”   

Although Cummings doesn’t say it straight out, the 1996 Melbourne Cup winner Saintly, is his favourite. “If he hadn’t broken down, he would have been one of the best, I’d say.” Later he lists an order of sorts: Saintly, Galilee, Light Fingers, Shaftesbury Avenue and adds, “But Saintly was something special, I thought.”

The best horse he has seen? “Secretariat in America. Unbelievable – he won the Belmont Stakes by three-quarters of a furlong.”

His best jockeys? “Roy Higgins in his prime was one of the better ones. He had the powers of perception (that enabled him to anticipate trouble in a field and dodge it).” Others mentioned were Glynn Pretty (before he was injured), Bill Williamson (only seen at the end of his career) and Englishman Lester Piggott.

Can Viewed win another Cup? “If he’s not weighted out …if he’s weighted as well as the fisherman’s horse who won three.” (The “fisherman” of course is Tony Santic whose wonderful mare Makybe Diva won three in a row, 2003-05.)

Bart regards synthetic tracks as a disaster, saying if you follow America (where there are plenty), you go broke … in Wall St or in racing.” Natural grass or coarse river sand are his preferred surfaces. 

Public speaking isn’t a preferred option for Cummings, although he is being paraded at more and more functions as his legend grows. It seems “just doing his job” has an off-course extension. Clearly, Cummings prefers the racecourse, but those who got close up with their champion at Champions loved the snippets they heard from his lifetime in racing.

The washup from a big weekend in racing, and a look towards the next one – whether you’re seeking reasons/excuses or some mail from left field, or you just need help to make a quid on the punt, read on …

THEY SAID IT

Trainer Greg Eurell, after Apache Cat’s dominant win in the Group 1 Australia Stakes at Moonee Valley on Saturday, following a poor run in the Lightning Stakes two weeks earlier: “There’s only one way you silence the critics in this industry – you win.”

Apache Cat’s rider Damien Oliver on looking around in the straight: “I was waiting for the Hussler.  I thought, ‘Where is he, he’s got to be coming soon,’ but he just didn’t come.”

And Oliver on Apache Cat: “He’s a great horse, too, you know. He won five consecutive Group 1s last season.”

Ron Dufficy, a commentator worth listening to, asked on Sky Channel the morning after the Australia Stakes: “Are we just clutching at straws and looking for answers that are not there?” Yes, he was talking about Weekend Hussler’s failure, his fourth on end.

Dwayne Dunn, after winning on Centurytwentyone at the Valley, despite spending time in hospital during the week to ensure an infection didn’t cost him a finger: “I struggle counting to 10 now; if I lose one I’m in trouble.”

Tim Clark, who won on Hot Danish at Randwick, describes riding the grand mare : “I feel I’m six foot tall and bullet proof.”

WE SAW IT

Good mares almost always give their all, and two did just that in the wet at Randwick on Saturday – the five-year-old Hot Danish, winner of the Breeders Classic, and the three-year-old Samantha Miss, a strong second in the Light Fingers Stakes. And taking it down several rungs from those Group 2 races, the honest eight-year-old Sensational Toy was a brave winner at $7 at Moonee Valley. All were 1200m races.

Palacio De Crystal, a winner for Grahame Begg in Melbourne in the spring, ran first up at home at Randwick in the style of a big race winner in the making. She was a smooth eighth at $31 in Samantha Miss’s race, won by Rock Me Baby.

Apache Cat did more for racing than win a Group 1 on Saturday, winning over the children – and their mums and dads – who got to pat the horse as strapper Ty Poulton walked him around the back ring after the Australia Stakes. The Cat was still there at 5.10pm, an hour after his race, and Poulton stopped each time someone asked for a pat and/or a photo. There were scores of happy racegoers, although one little boy did burst into tears when his dad called the Cat over.

Damien Oliver’s $200 fine for his celebratory gesture was a joke – we understand stewards have to be wary of the dangers of grandstanding and Ollie’s action was before the post, but it was barely a wave, more an acknowledgment. And the jockey who had sneaked a peek at the big screen well before the post, knew he was lengths clear.  A suggestion: Racing Victoria Limited should give the $200 to the bushfire appeal, for which Ollie and Eurell are already doing their bit – Eurell has donated Apache Cat’s burgundy and lime silks  to be auctioned for the appeal; Oliver will sign them.

WE’LL WATCH  IT

To steal from The Who, “She’s a substitute for another girl, She looks pretty tall but her heels are high …” She is Michelle Payne, and she will sub for Clare Lindop on Rose Darmore in the $1 million Group 1 Blue Diamond Stakes at Caulfield on Saturday – Lindop, who rode Rose Darmore when she ran on nicely for third in the fillies’ Prelude (1100m) on February 7, will team with another of trainer Leon Macdonald’s fillies, the three-year-old Augusta Proud, in Saturday’s Listed Redelva Stakes (1000m) at the final meeting scheduled for Cheltenham. Augusta Proud is one of Lindop’s favourites and her 6-9 winning record includes the Magic Millions for two-year-olds on the Gold Coast last March. Payne jumped at the chance to step in at Caulfield when Dwayne Dunn, tipped to take the ride, found a handy substitute of his own – Maka Ena, for his boss, Lee Freedman, second fancy in the stable behind Come Hither, to be ridden by Darley’s No. 1 man in Australia, Kerrin McEvoy.  McEvoy rode Maka Ena, also owned by Darley, when fourth in the fillies Preview (1000m) on January 26. Dunn’s Diamond record is second to none, with four wins in the past four years, and at his only rides in the race. It will be Payne’s first Diamond. TAB Sportbet has Rose Darmore at $51, Maka Ena $31 and Come Hither $10, with Rostova ($2.60) and Real Saga ($3.20) the shorties.

The Group 1 Diamond has top billing at the Heath on Saturday ahead of the Group 1 Oakleigh Plate (1100m), the Group 2 St George Stakes (1800m), the Group 2 Autumn Stakes (1400m, 3YOs) and the Group 2 Angus Armanasco Stakes (1200m, 3YO fillies).

 Sydney’s meeting is at Rosehill, with the Group 2 Apollo Strakes (1400m, WFA) the focus.

 Who will get the ride on Mic Mac when Greg Eurell’s “next big thing” goes to Sydney? Saturday’s winner Damien Oliver will pitch for it – and he can persuasive, and he’ll be on stablemate Apache Cat in the Group 1 Sprint, the T.J. Smith (1200m) at Randwick on April 18 – but owner Maurice Messara has told Eurell he wants a Sydney jockey. Glyn Schofield does a lot of riding for the Messara family, but Hugh Bowman will have first dibs, Eurell saying Bowman’s manager had been contacted.