Belleluia has accepted for Mornington (1200m) on Saturday, November 14.

Race 5 3.55pm. Jockey Luke Currie. Barrier 3.

Belleluia has trained well since her excellent debut win at Traralgon. She will have derived great experience from that run and looks one of the main chances here. The track and distance will suit and Luke Currie keeps the winning partnership intact from a nice barrier in 3. I believe she is an excellent chance to make ot two wins from two runs.

Regards

Robbie.

Texan Eric O’Keefe, author of The Cup, the remarkable story of Damien Oliver’s emotion-charged ride from tragedy – the death of his brother Jason in a track fall – to triumph on Media Puzzle in the 2002 Melbourne Cup, has marked his return to the US from this year’s Cup with a strong statement about Australia’s greatest race.

O’Keefe uses the world-renowned Breeders’ Cup carnival at Santa Anita, California, to compare American racing’s travails with the Melbourne Cup and the robust state of racing in Australia.

“I’ll tell you what they (Australians) do have going for them: the sort of press that champions a great story,” O’Keefe writes on www.huffingpost.com.

To read his report CLICK HERE

Belleluia’s debut win at Traralgon was a highlight for The Thoroughbred Magazine Club.

Her convincing win also provided some joy for  club members who represented us at Traralgon.

Below are some of their thoughts about the day and some of the congratulatory messages we have received.

THE REPORTS:

Hi Tanya,

Yes, I did attend the Traralgon Races to watch Belleluia in her first race and the win was great. (A necessity after attending her two trials)

Whilst I was the only member to contact Robbie (Irish) at the stalls, three other members (locals) arrived at the winners’ stall after the race and we all enjoyed a celebratory drink while watching the replays.

Robbie and staff were most welcoming and included me in the pre- and post-race operations, meeting jockey Luke Currie and experiencing the instructions and assessment of the run.

As an occasional racegoer this experience afforded me by Robbie and staff from the Griffiths stables and The Thoroughbred Magazine Club was most appreciative and made my day at the races “as an owner” most memorable.

Yours sincerely,

Norm Whetton

Hi Tanya,

My wife and I attended the Traralgon races.The Secretary’s Office were aware of our names and allocated the appropriate tickets so we could get nice and close to Belleluia.

Had the opportunity to listen to the directions for Luke Currie and were amongst the winners’ circle at the end of the day.

The strapper actually fainted, as it was so hot, but Luke still provided a race review and indicated the horse’s ability going forward.

We were then whisked away upstairs, offered a drink and given the opportunity to review the race.

We were well looked after, and absolutely enjoyed the experience.

Look forward to watching many more wins in the future, and thank you and The Thoroughbred Magazine Cub for the opportunity to be involved.

Cheers,

Steve Wright

Hello Tanya,

Traralgon on Derby day is an annual event for my wife and I, and the fact that Belleluia was having her first start in a race made it a special day. The filly handled herself pretty well in the mounting yard; given that it was her first start and it was a very hot day, she remained really well composed. She also had a drama to deal with at the barriers – the horses had to be backed out of the barriers and the start delayed (it seemed to be about 10 minutes) because the barriers wouldn’t open – no suprise that she wasn’t the best to jump.  Belleluia opened up at odds of around 5/4, the short quote was to be expected given the large number of connections she has. Luke Currie rode her with confidence and had her three-wide and in the clear at the top of the straight. Belleluia balanced up and sprinted away from her rivals to win comfortably by about 3 1/2 lengths – quite impressive really.

It was a bit of a thrill to meet up with three other blokes who had come along to watch the filly’s first race – Norm had travelled from Glen Waverley and had even seen the filly at trackwork on occasions. Good on you, Norm.

The lowlight was Belleluia’s strapper missing the finish of the race after an incident at the winning post (she fainted) – I hope she has recovered and is well.

Good luck to all for Mornington

Regards

Warren James

CONGRATULATIONS MESSAGES

Greetings

Congratulations to everyone concerned with the win yesterday.  Belleluia looked very good in winning – maybe this time next year!!!

Regards

David Hoy

Good Morning Staff,

Just a very quick response to your current Newsletter re Bellleluia. It was a tremendous effort and victory, so would like very much for you to pass on my congratulations to Robbie and all his staff for a well-deserved win. On that effort there appears to be more in store. Look forward to seeing the video and watching next week’s race at Mornington.

Kind regards

Noel Gray

Thankyou for the info and congratulations on a great win. She looks the goods. Hope she continues to do well.

Marg Peoples

Congratulations on a great win !

Linda Fleiter

The biggest story, from the racing industry’s perspective, from the spring carnival is one that has been either ignored, or misrepresented, from media that either do not fully understand the issue, or are too conflicted to report on it objectively – that’s the TV ratings for Cup week.

Quite simply, the stunning TV viewing numbers for the Melbourne Cup, which achieved its highest figures since the Oztam ratings system were introduced in 2001, vindicated the decision of the Victoria Racing Club and Channel 7 to protect the exclusivity of the television broadcasting rights.

TVN, a pay channel that proudly promotes itself as the industry’s TV station, has been running a campaign discrediting the exclusive rights of free-to-air Channel 7, by claiming that TVN is appealing to a different audience – namely the hardened racing viewer.

Well given that Channel 7’s target audience for the Melbourne Cup is “everyone”, I’m not quite sure who doesn’t fit into that category.

And yes, while parts of the coverage is fluffy, celebrity-based vacuous drivel where sponsor-mentions and promotions for shows that you have no intention of watching dominate, the races themselves, along with the pre- and post-event analysis was of world-class standard.

Bruce McAvaney, Richard Freedman, Simon Marshall, Francesca Cumani and Peter Donegan are as talented and well-balanced a line-up as any sports fan could hope for, and critically they didn’t slip into “racing lingo”, and that enabled the once-a-year viewer to make sense of the action.

Instead of in-fighting and sniping, racing should be celebrating that for one week of the year it is still the centre of the nation’s sporting focus.

The next and most critical step is for the mass viewing numbers to be parlayed into a significant increase at the next round of rights negotiations.

ASSAULT WITH A MILLINERY WEAPON

Speaking of the coverage, if there was a more cringeworthy and embarrassing moment in Australian sport this year than Melbourne Cup-winning trainer Mark Kavanagh twice having an Emirates baseball cap forcefully shoved on his head during post-race interviews, then this writer missed it.

The VRC should have been embarrassed not just by the actions of either its employee or the representative of the sponsor, but by the fact in 2009 there is still no formalized post-race structure for the winning connections.

If international tennis players – the world’s most notoriously selfish and surly sportsmen – can walk straight to a professionally presented media area post-match, why can’t the generally affable and available elite-level Australian horse trainers – and Kavanagh certainly fits into that category – have the same luxury?

Simply, have an area that connections are required to go to should they win the race, rather than have the winning owner(s), trainer and jockey trot off to a media conference when they can be guided there after the long presentation.

There you can have a background featuring Emirates logos, Emirates flight attendants and, if Emirates really thinks it’s necessary, Emirates pilots standing on each other’s shoulders.

Just put the baseball caps out to pasture please!

Editor’s note: The VRC does conduct a post-race press conference involving all connections to the Melbourne Cup winner, held after the presentation ceremony. The time Ralph is referring to is immediately after the running of the race.

BROWN STOKED

Still on the post-race …

Could you imagine Tiger Woods bursting into tears after receiving his 34^th green jacket at Augusta at the age of 60 and then apologising to the assembled media for the brevity of his victory speech due to his pressing commitments at a local putting competition?

What about Ricky Ponting raising his bat to a packed SCG crowd after hitting the winning runs in an Ashes clinching series and then jumping into a cab to the North Sydney oval for a quick 20/20 game for his native Tassie Tigers?

Or James Tomkins rowing himself to Olympic immortality in London and then ducking off to steer a Barbie-boat down the Thames?

Well, seriously, how ridiculous is it that the Melbourne Cup-winning jockey is required to ride in a (relatively) nondescript race less than an hour after reaching the pinnacle of his sport?

Seeing Corey Brown trot off to ride Stokehouse so soon after elatedly returning on Shocking just goes into the I-don’t-get-it category.

In this case, would David Hayes have objected to the available Damien Oliver, Steven King, Danny Nikolic or Blake Shinn being thrown the silks? Doubt it.

Surely when you climb to the top of the mountain you’re entitled to enjoy the view!

Leading trainer Brian Mayfield-Smith has announced his intention to retire. Mayfield-Smith will close his Flemington stable at the end of November.

Mayfield-Smith cited economic reasons for the decision – the second time he has retired from training in his career. “It costs me $6000 a week to keep open a stable of 26 horses,” Mayfield-Smith told Sky Channel’s Andrew Bensley.

Mayfield-Smith is best known for ending the run of Sydney Trainers’ Premiership wins by the legendary Tommy Smith, who had won 33 in succession before Mayfield-Smith’s 99 winners in 1985-86 beat Smith for the title. Mayfield-Smith, who won the next two Sydney premierships, has trained 30 Group 1 winners.

The Brian Mayfield-Smith profile, as it appeared in the 2008-09 edition of Racing In Australia.

BRIAN MAYFIELD-SMITH

Born: May 24, 1947.

Brian Mayfield-Smith’s interest in horses was developed during his days as a stockman on remote cattle stations in far North Queensland and the Northern Territory. He started working as a strapper in 1967 in Brisbane, moving to Sydney in 1968 for a short stint with trainer Jack Denham. 

Mayfield-Smith was granted his training licence in 1971 and based himself at Cairns, training his first winner with his first starter, in April that year – Gay Meld who won by 10 lengths at Mareeba. 

He then moved to Townsville in late 1972, training from a caravan under a tree on the home turn, not long after arriving, he trained his first winner with his first runner.

In 1974, Mayfield-Smith relocated to Doomben, again training a winner with his first starter from his new base. It was in Doomben that Brian produced his first ’star’ horse, Tiger Town, who won several good races in Brisbane and Sydney. 

Mayfield-Smith made the move to Sydney in 1976, again his first runner was a winner, with Tiger Town being beaten a nose in the 1976 Group 1 Epsom Handicap (1600m, Randwick). He also was narrowly beaten in the 1977 Group 1 Stradbroke Handicap (1400km, Eagle Farm) in Brisbane. 

In 1978, he became private trainer for Millie Fox at Nebo Lodge, Rosehill. A position he held for six years, training more than 300 winners and his first Group 1 winner, Brindisi in the 1980 AJC The Metropolitan Handicap (2400m) at Randwick. 

In 1984, Robert Sangster and Bob Lapointe took over the ownership of Nebo Lodge, and appointed Mayfield-Smith as their trainer.

In the 1985-86 season, Mayfield-Smith won the Sydney Trainers’ Premiership with 99 winners, ending Tommy Smith’s 33-year dominance of the title. Mayfield-Smith won the title in the next two years and added the 1987 Golden Slipper Stakes with Marauding on his CV.

In 1987, Mayfield-Smith and his wife Maree took a trip to South Africa that changed their lives. They travelled to South Africa eight times in the next nine years, before Mayfield-Smith made the shock announcement of his retirement from training to move to South Africa to commence a career as a wildlife conservationist, particularly to save the white Rhinoceros.

The South Africa adventure didn’t work out to their liking and the Mayfield-Smiths returned to Australia and opened a boutique training stable at Flemington, with the aim of raising funds for wildlife conservation through training racehorses.

As he has done in every move previously, Mayfield-Smith trained a winner with his first Flemington runner, winning on his home track with Wry Hero.

Mayfield-Smith released his autobiography, titled The Outsider in November 2000.

Mayfield-Smith has the capacity to train 26 horses at Flemington, and his return to training sees him constantly leading the strike-rate averages, with a best season of 27.8% winners to runners in 2001-02. Since his return, he has won eight Group 1 races, including Oliver Twist (2000 Underwood Stakes & Mackinnon Stakes); Rubitano (2002 Newmarket Handicap & Salinger Stakes), Sudurka (2001 Oakleigh Plate & Salinger Stakes) and Lyrical Bid (2006 Myer Classic).

Stables: Flemington

First winner: Gay Meld, Mareeba (Qld), April 1971.

First Group 1 winner: Brindisi, AJC Metropolitan Handicap, October 1980.

Group 1 winners: 30

The first time I met Ivan Allan was in 1994 when I was racing manager for Lee Freedman.

Allan, who at that time was the leading trainer in Hong Kong, bred and raced a number of horse in Australia, and he had a couple of likely prospects in the Freedman stable.

I collected Allan from Tullamarine and drove him to the stables at Flemington. We struck up an immediate rapport, especially when he learned that before joining Freedman I was a racing writer and that I was a colleague and close friend of his great mate, The Herald’s doyen scribe Jack Elliott.

Allan also was a “scribe” of sorts as the publisher of Hong Kong’s Silks weekly racing form paper.

It struck me that Allan had an insatiable appetite for knowledge. He asked a lot of questions and seemed very interested in the answers. Talk for Allan wasn’t a time filler.

He was very keen to learn about Freedman’s theories and ideas. It was also my job on behalf of Freedman to convince Allan that he should keep his horses in Melbourne rather than whisk them off to Hong Kong as soon as they showed enough talent – which was his want.

I don’t think it took Allan too long to work out the game plan.

At the end of a long day of driving around Melbourne, which included stints buying horse products whenever we came across a Horse Land outlet or something similar, Allan invited me to Hong Kong. “Let me know whenever you want to come to Hong Kong. I’ll pay for your trip,” he said.

I was very grateful for the offer but didn’t think much more of it. Two years later, my wife Glynis and I were in Hong Kong for the December International races and I bumped into Allan one morning at track work at Sha Tin. His immediate response on seeing me was: “I thought I told you to ring me and I’d pay for your trip.”

I told Allan that as much as I appreciated his offer, it wasn’t one I could accept.

Not long after we arrived back in Melbourne, a letter arrived post-marked from Hong Kong. Inside was a bank cheque for $2000 and a hand-written note from Ivan Allan.

Allan’s influence spread far and wide. He owned the 1984 Group 1 English St Leger winner Commanche Run, trained by a young Luca Cumani, the top stayer Classic Cliché, winner of the 1995 St. Leger and Group 1 Ascot Gold Cup, and the Group winning sprinter Citidancer, who stood at stud in New Zealand and Australia.

Allan was seven times champion trainer of Malaysia and Singapore before taking up a position in Hong Kong in 1992. In his 12 years in Hong Kong, he won three trainers’ premierships. His best Hong Kong horse was the Australian-bred Fairy King Prawn (b g 1995, Danehill (USA)-Twiglet, by Twig Moss (FR)), who also won the 2000 Group 1 Yasuda Kinen (1600m) in Japan. In Hong Kong, he trained 36 Group winners and six times he had the Horse Of The Year.

One of the best horses he raced in Australia was Mr. Vitality (b g 1991, Snippets-Savana City, by New Regent (CAN)), who was a smart dual-Listed winner in Australia for trainer David Hayes before heading to Hong Kong in 1994 where he became one of the top sprinters.

In 1983, just before he left Singapore, Allan was gunned down outside his home – he was hit five times in the back – but survived to tell the story. “Indestructible” was his tag, but a long battle with diabetes did to Allan what an assassin’s bullets couldn’t.

Ivan Allan, champion trainer and champion bloke, died in Singapore last week, aged 68, after a long battle with illness.

Leading trainer Brian Mayfield-Smith has announced his intention to retire. Mayfield-Smith will close his Flemington stable at the end of November.

Mayfield-Smith cited economic reasons for the decision – the second time he has retired from training in his career. “It costs me $6000 a week to keep open a stable of 26 horses,” Mayfield-Smith told Sky Channel’s Andrew Bensley.

Mayfield-Smith is best known for ending the run of Sydney Trainers’ Premiership wins by the legendary Tommy Smith, who had won 33 in succession before Mayfield-Smith’s 99 winners in 1985-86 beat Smith for the title. Mayfield-Smith, who won the next two Sydney premierships, has trained 30 Group 1 winners.

The Brian Mayfield-Smith profile, as it appeared in the 2008-09 edition of Racing In Australia.

BRIAN MAYFIELD-SMITH

Born: May 24, 1947.

Brian Mayfield-Smith’s interest in horses was developed during his days as a stockman on remote cattle stations in far North Queensland and the Northern Territory. He started working as a strapper in 1967 in Brisbane, moving to Sydney in 1968 for a short stint with trainer Jack Denham.

Mayfield-Smith was granted his training licence in 1971 and based himself at Cairns, training his first winner with his first starter, in April that year – Gay Meld who won by 10 lengths at Mareeba.

He then moved to Townsville in late 1972, training from a caravan under a tree on the home turn, not long after arriving, he trained his first winner with his first runner.

In 1974, Mayfield-Smith relocated to Doomben, again training a winner with his first starter from his new base. It was in Doomben that Brian produced his first ’star’ horse, Tiger Town, who won several good races in Brisbane and Sydney.

Mayfield-Smith made the move to Sydney in 1976, again his first runner was a winner, with Tiger Town being beaten a nose in the 1976 Group 1 Epsom Handicap (1600m, Randwick). He also was narrowly beaten in the 1977 Group 1 Stradbroke Handicap (1400km, Eagle Farm) in Brisbane.

In 1978, he became private trainer for Millie Fox at Nebo Lodge, Rosehill. A position he held for six years, training more than 300 winners and his first Group 1 winner, Brindisi in the 1980 AJC The Metropolitan Handicap (2400m) at Randwick.

In 1984, Robert Sangster and Bob Lapointe took over the ownership of Nebo Lodge, and appointed Mayfield-Smith as their trainer.

In the 1985-86 season, Mayfield-Smith won the Sydney Trainers’ Premiership with 99 winners, ending Tommy Smith’s 33-year dominance of the title. Mayfield-Smith won the title in the next two years and added the 1987 Golden Slipper Stakes with Marauding on his CV.

In 1987, Mayfield-Smith and his wife Maree took a trip to South Africa that changed their lives. They travelled to South Africa eight times in the next nine years, before Mayfield-Smith made the shock announcement of his retirement from training to move to South Africa to commence a career as a wildlife conservationist, particularly to save the white Rhinoceros.

The South Africa adventure didn’t work out to their liking and the Mayfield-Smiths returned to Australia and opened a boutique training stable at Flemington, with the aim of raising funds for wildlife conservation through training racehorses.

As he has done in every move previously, Mayfield-Smith trained a winner with his first Flemington runner, winning on his home track with Wry Hero.

Mayfield-Smith released his autobiography, titled The Outsider in November 2000.

Mayfield-Smith has the capacity to train 26 horses at Flemington, and his return to training sees him constantly leading the strike-rate averages, with a best season of 27.8% winners to runners in 2001-02. Since his return, he has won eight Group 1 races, including Oliver Twist (2000 Underwood Stakes & Mackinnon Stakes); Rubitano (2002 Newmarket Handicap & Salinger Stakes), Sudurka (2001 Oakleigh Plate & Salinger Stakes) and Lyrical Bid (2006 Myer Classic).

Stables: Flemington

First winner: Gay Meld, Mareeba (Qld), April 1971.

First Group 1 winner: Brindisi, AJC Metropolitan Handicap, October 1980.

Group 1 winners: 30

The first time I met Ivan Allan was in 1994 when I was racing manager for Lee Freedman.

Allan, who at that time was the leading trainer in Hong Kong, bred and raced a number of horse in Australia, and he had a couple of likely prospects in the Freedman stable.

I collected Allan from Tullamarine and drove him to the stables at Flemington. We struck up an immediate rapport, especially when he learned that before joining Freedman I was a racing writer and that I was a colleague and close friend of his great mate, The Herald’s doyen scribe Jack Elliott.

Allan also was a “scribe” of sorts as the publisher of Hong Kong’s Silks weekly racing form paper.

It struck me that Allan had an insatiable appetite for knowledge. He asked a lot of questions and seemed very interested in the answers. Talk for Allan wasn’t a time filler.

He was very keen to learn about Freedman’s theories and ideas. It was also my job on behalf of Freedman to convince Allan that he should keep his horses in Melbourne rather than whisk them off to Hong Kong as soon as they showed enough talent – which was his want.

I don’t think it took Allan too long to work out the game plan.

At the end of a long day of driving around Melbourne, which included stints buying horse products whenever we came across a Horse Land outlet or something similar, Allan invited me to Hong Kong. “Let me know whenever you want to come to Hong Kong. I’ll pay for your trip,” he said.

I was very grateful for the offer but didn’t think much more of it. Two years later, my wife Glynis and I were in Hong Kong for the December International races and I bumped into Allan one morning at track work at Sha Tin. His immediate response on seeing me was: “I thought I told you to ring me and I’d pay for your trip.”

I told Allan that as much as I appreciated his offer, it wasn’t one I could accept.

Not long after we arrived back in Melbourne, a letter arrived post-marked from Hong Kong. Inside was a bank cheque for $2000 and a hand-written note from Ivan Allan.

Allan’s influence spread far and wide. He owned the 1984 Group 1 English St Leger winner Commanche Run, trained by a young Luca Cumani, the top stayer Classic Cliché, winner of the 1995 St. Leger and Group 1 Ascot Gold Cup, and the Group winning sprinter Citidancer, who stood at stud in New Zealand and Australia.

Allan was seven times champion trainer of Malaysia and Singapore before taking up a position in Hong Kong in 1992. In his 12 years in Hong Kong, he won three trainers’ premierships. His best Hong Kong horse was the Australian-bred Fairy King Prawn (b g 1995, Danehill (USA)-Twiglet, by Twig Moss (FR)), who also won the 2000 Group 1 Yasuda Kinen (1600m) in Japan. In Hong Kong, he trained 36 Group winners and six times he had the Horse Of The Year.

One of the best horses he raced in Australia was Mr. Vitality (b g 1991, Snippets-Savana City, by New Regent (CAN)), who was a smart dual-Listed winner in Australia for trainer David Hayes before heading to Hong Kong in 1994 where he became one of the top sprinters.

In 1983, just before he left Singapore, Allan was gunned down outside his home – he was hit five times in the back – but survived to tell the story. “Indestructible” was his tag, but a long battle with diabetes did to Allan what an assassin’s bullets couldn’t.

Ivan Allan, champion trainer and champion bloke, died in Singapore last week, aged 68, after a long battle with illness.

THEY SAID IT

“Bart said to me, ‘I always knew you’d win a Melbourne Cup.’ I said, ‘Yeah, when did you know?’ He said, ‘Always.’ “  Trainer Mark Kavanagh reveals what Bart Cummings, who has trained 12 Cup winners, said to him after he won his first with Shocking.

“Caulfield’s great. Cox Plate day’s good. But there’s nothing like these four days.” Jockey Michael Rodd comments on the week of racing in Australia. Rodd had six winners during the Flemington carnival, including the Oaks on Faint Perfume. Most were with Kavanagh (who had five), but not the Cup – Rodd couldn’t make the 51kg and Corey Brown (who had four) stepped up to win the biggest prize.

“He went over there a Mini Minor and came back a Rolls-Royce,” said Cranbourne trainer Dean Howard of It’llbefantastic, winner of the Listed Hilton Stakes (1400m) at Flemington on Saturday. It’llbefantastic (Ch g 3, Fantastic Light (USA)-Quantum Leap, by Regal Classic (CAN)) was taken to Perth for a trial and two races (third both times) in July-August. His two runs this Victorian campaign have returned two wins. The chestnut is the younger brother of the winner of the greys’ race on Oaks day, Outlandish Lad, a 4yo gelding trained by Kavanagh.

WE SAW IT

An amazing sprint win by All Silent (B g 6, Belong To Me (USA)-Lisheenowen, by Semipalatinsk (USA)) in the Group 1 Patinack Farm Classic (1200m) was the highlight of the final day at Flemington, but the win of the weekend was seen on television on Sunday morning – Zenyatta in the G1 Breeders’ Cup Classic (2000m) on the dirt at Santa Anita, California.

Zenyatta (B/br m 2004, Street Cry (IRE)-Vertigineux (USA), by Kris S (USA)) stamped herself as America’s favourite with a stunning from-last win, her 14th from 14 races. This was the first time she had beaten the males, and it was in one of the world’s biggest races worth $US5 million, which converts to a touch less than the $5.5 million Melbourne Cup won by another Street Cry – Shocking (B h 4, Street Cry (IRE)-Maria Di Castiglia (GB), by Danehill (USA)).

English stayer Conduit (Ch h 2005, Dalakhani (IRE)-Well Head (IRE, by Sadler’s Wells (USA)) won the $US3 million G1 Breeders’ Cup Turf (2400m) for the second year on end for the Sir Michael Stoute-Ryan Moore combination.

But back to All Silent, albeit indirectly – Nick Hall’s win on the sprinter was his second Group 1 success (after Efficient in the Turnbull Stakes) of his first spring as a senior rider. He is a young rider going places, and not just to Hong Kong with All Silent next month.

WE’LL WATCH IT

The G1 Cathay Pacific International Sprint (1200m) at Sha Tin in Hong Kong on December 13 is shaping as a display race for Australian sprinters with All Silent a likely acceptor runner, Apache Cat (Ch g 7, Lion Cavern (USA)-Tennessee Blaze, by Whiskey Road (USA)) booked to fly out on December 1 and Scenic Blast (B/br g 5, Scenic (IRE)-Daughter’s Charm, by Delgado (USA)) already there.

The race is the final leg of the Global Sprint Challenge, and if Scenic Blast can win he will earn a $1million bonus – he will warm up against local opposition in the G2 Sprint Trial (1200m) at Sha Tin on November 22. Apache Cat has been there before, running third in the G1 Sprint last December.

All Silent has been there, too, but less successfully – trainer John Size couldn’t get him (then known as Chiu Shan Elite) to settle in and, after poor runs in barrier trials, Neville Begg, who sold him to race there, took him back to Sydney. Neville’s son Grahame has trained him since, and he now challenges Scenic Blast, the reigning horse of the year, as Australia’s top sprinter.

Both Beggs have been to Hong Kong, too. Neville trained there in the early 1990s and Grahame, who took over his father’s Sydney stables, won the International Bowl with Monopolize at Sha Tin in 1995 and ‘96.

Australian trainers David Hall (Hong Kong, Saturday) and John Meagher (Singapore, Sunday) had trebles at the weekend. The big race at Kranji, the G1 Singapore Gold Cup (2200m) was won for the second year by El Dorado (B g 2004, Stay Gold (JPN)-White Leap (JPN), by White Muzzle (GB)), trained by Hideuyuki Takaoka and ridden by Ronnie Stewart, the team that brought Jolie’s Shinju to Melbourne for the spring.

Melbourne’s focus switches to Sandown on Saturday with the G2 Sandown Classic (2400m) and G2 Sandown Guineas (1600m). They also race at Rosehill, Eagle Farm, Morphettville and Ascot.

Trainer Murray Baker has confirmed that there is interest from overseas studs in his recently retired entire Nom Du Jeu.

Baker said he has had two inquiries from agents acting for European breeders asking about the availability of Nom Du Jeu as a stallion prospect.

Nom Du Jeu, the 2008 Group 1 AJC Derby (2400m, Randwick) winner, has been troubled all year with bone-bruising that forced his retirement after failing in the Group 1 Cox Plate (wfa 2040m) at Moonee Valley.

The son of Montjeu and the Group 1 winning mare Prized Gem (by Prized (USA)) has arrived back at Baker’s Cambridge stables. “He’s in magnificent order, you wouldn’t know there is anything wrong with him,” Baker said.

“I will discuss all our options with his owner (Queenslander Billie Morton), but we will take our time before we make a decision on his future. I am sure there will be studs in New Zealand that will be keen to stand a Group 1 winning son of Montjeu.”

Baker said that interest from breeders in another son of Montjeu, the Windsor Park-based Guillotine (ex-Refused To Dance, by Defensive Play (USA)), encourages him to think that there is a commercial future for Nom Du Jeu as a stallion.

“Guillotine will cover between 80 and 100 mares, which is a pretty good start to his first season,” Baker said.

“I can understand the overseas interest in Nom Du Jeu, because he fits very well as a National Hunt stallion prospect.”