My Lord, the memories

As a boy my interest in horse racing was fostered by my father, Kevin, a man of good Irish stock, who had a casual affiliation with the local SP, and later the TAB. He had two racing heroes at the time. One was the champion Tulloch, a horse as good as any that has raced in Australia.

I remember the family’s disappointment at Tulloch’s struggling seventh under a big weight (64kg) behind Hi Jinx in the 1960 Melbourne Cup. We watched a replay of the race during a racing show, hosted by Maurie Kirby, that also included a “tipster” dressed as a petrol station owner, who had the inside info.

That tout was really chirpy bookmaker Eric Timms, who later became a good friend of mine when I worked as a racing writer, because the media savvy Timms was for many years the main provider of betting markets for newspapers.

The other hero that had my father muttering about greatness under his breath was the wonderfully enduring weight-for-age star Lord (NZ) (b g 1954, Targui (FR)-Broadway, by Actor (FR)).

It was Lord that tested Tulloch in his glorious comeback win in the Queen’s Plate (2000m) at Flemington in March, 1960, but Lord was more than an understudy to Tulloch. He may have lacked the sheer talent of Tulloch, but he lacked nothing in courage, longevity and impact … year in, year out.

I learned to love Lord by the simple fact that he kept campaigning at the spring and autumn carnivals until 1963, when I was 10 years old and had developed my appreciation for racing far beyond the opinions of my father. Lord and his great adversary Dhaulagiri became my earliest racing heroes.

After Lord’s retirement at the end of the 1963 spring, aged nine, I took to following horses raced by Lord’s trainer Ken Hilton and his chief owner, W.R. Kemball – the colours were white, red band and blue cap – that distinctively had short, one word names such as Future, Proud and Havelock (later raced by Tommy Harrison, who named his Pearcedale stables after him).

It’s good to see Lord’s name come up over the weekend following Zipping’s fourth Group 2 Sandown Classic (WFA, 2400m) win at Sandown. Like Zipping (pictured), Lord also won a feature weight-for-age race in four consecutive years – the Group 2 Memsie Stakes (1400m) at Caulfield.

He won his first Memsie as a 4YO in 1958, returning each year to win it until 1962 when he finished third behind Webster. In 1963, as a 9YO, he finished second to Coppelius.

Lord was an amazing horse, and for all that Zipping has achieved he falls a long way short of Lord on their race records.

Lord won 28 races, 21 of them on his home track, Caulfield, and 20 of them were under weight-for-age conditions. He was a pure Melbourne champion – his only win outside Melbourne was the 1959 All Aged Stakes (WFA, 1600m) at Randwick.

Take a look at this amazing record of Lord’s dominance of weight-for-age races in Melbourne, bearing in mind he had some outstanding rivals, such as Aquanita, Dhaulagiri, Anonyme, Nilarco, Trellios, Sometime, Havelock, Sky High, Prince Darius, Sir Blink, Wiggle, Webster and Skyline:

• Memsie Stakes (4 wins)
• Caulfield Stakes (3)
• Underwood Stakes (2)
• St George Stakes (2)
• C F Orr Stakes (2)
• Queen’s Plate (2)
• Queen Elizabeth Stakes (2)
• Liston Stakes (1)
• Craiglee Stakes (1)
• All Aged Stakes (1)

Lord raced from two to nine. He won three of his five juvenile starts, but didn’t really hit his straps until he turned four – his 20 weight-for-age wins spanned five years.

He showed his ability to lump big weights by winning the 1959 Futurity Stakes (1400m, Caulfield) with 10st 6lb (66kg) under handicap conditions; a year later he carried 66.5kg to finish third behind Todman (64.5kg); and in 1961, he had the same big weight and it took a great horse in Sky High (60.5kg) to beat him.

Despite his wonderful weight-for-age record Lord didn’t compete in a Cox Plate. Hilton realised early on in the gelding’s career that the tight Moonee Valley track didn’t suit his long-striding champion and he protected him accordingly.

Zipping needs to return in 2011 to try to match Manikato’s Australian record of winning the same feature race five times – Manikato won five William Reid Stakes at Moonee Valley between 1979 and 1983.

Manikato also won four Futurity Stakes and Tie The Knot claimed four Chipping Norton Stakes (three at Warwick Farm, one at Randwick). Four other Australian horses have won the same feature four times – Trafalgar (Randwick Plate, Randwick), Doiran (Great Easter Steeplechase, Oakbank), Zama Lad (Yalumba Classic Hurdle, Oakbank) and Royal Snack (Moe Cup, Moe).

The world record holder for repeat feature wins is believed to be the American handicapper Leaping Plum, who claimed eight Grasmick Handicaps, a humble 800-metre race run at one of racing’s backwater racetracks in Nebraska – his first was in 1995 and his last as a 12YO in 2003. He also finished third in 2002.