Title : The world's top trainer, Aidan O'Brien, has his Cup dream stymied ... by his son
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The world's top trainer, Aidan O'Brien, has his Cup dream stymied ... by his son
Ireland's Aidan O'Brien is known as the Master of Ballydoyle, the man who plots world racing domination from a multi-million-dollar racing operation in County Tipperary.
His attention to detail and fierce determination to win has seen him rack up ridiculous numbers of some of the oldest and greatest races in the world.
At 48, he has conquered most of racing's major challenges — he has dominated Ascot, trained a 1-2-3 in France's world-renowned Prix de L'Arc de Triomphe and even trained the winner of the 2014 Cox Plate with Adelaide.
One of the last big prizes to elude him has been the Melbourne Cup, where O'Brien has been bringing horses to Flemington for over a decade without the ultimate success.
On one memorable — for all the wrong reasons — trip to Australia in 2008, O'Brien fell foul of the stewards for his directions for his three horses — Septimus, who finished 18th, Alessandro Volta who finished 20th and Honolulu who was 21st and last.
Under strong questioning in the stewards room, O'Brien admitted he had got his tactics wrong — the trio were five lengths clear just after halfway — and that he could have "taken all the horses out" on the morning of the race because the ground was so hard at Flemington.
O'Brien returned to Ireland and did not return to Flemington for another seven years.
In 2017 — having still not won the Cup — O'Brien took his performance as a trainer to another level, taking major races left, right and centre.
He broke the world record for Group One wins on the flat in a year — previously 25, held by American trainer Bobby Frankel.
He set a new record late last month when Saxon Warrior won the Racing Post Trophy at Doncaster for his 26th success, then hours before the start of Derby Day at Flemington, O'Brien's horse Mendelssohn made it 27 when he won the Breeder's Cup Juvenile Turf at Del Mar in California.
It seemed the perfect year to crown his achievements by adding another success, and ending his Melbourne Cup drought into the bargain.
His challenger for the Cup was Johannes Vermeer, the brilliant bay horse whose fast finishing bursts in the Caulfield Stakes and Caulfield Cup had seen him emerge as one of the leading chances for Flemington.
The horse needed a good draw, and a good run — Johannes Vermeer got both, and when the field emerged into the straight, Marmelo hit the front, but Ben Melham had O'Brien's horse waiting to unleash.
Johannes Vermeer moved clear at the 350m, while the co-favourite Marmelo quickly faded.
Two more internationals, France's Tiberian and the Irish-trained Max Dynamite, were also coming through.
Max Dynamite's trainer Willy Mullins, another wily Irishman, had prepared the 2015 runner-up with an eye to fooling the handicappers, putting his horse through a training run at Killarney in county Kerry under 73kg as a Cup lead-up.
He moved up to challenge Johannes Vermeer, but his run wasn't strong enough.
Joseph O'Brien's quick Cup history
| Year | Horse | Place |
|---|---|---|
| 2017 | Rekindling | 1st |
| 2017 | US Army Ranger | 18th |
Down the outside, however, was a horse from a familiar source — Aidan O'Brien's son Joseph's talented young galloper Rekindling.
Joseph had ridden two dozen major winners for his father - including an Ascot Gold Cup, an English St Leger, the English and Irish 2,000 Guineas and the Breeder's Cup Turf.
He had to hang up the riding boots because of his weight, but he shifted into training in 2016. Thanks to the links between Lloyd Williams and Aidan O'Brien, the younger O'Brien had carriage of two Williams horses, Rekindling and his father's old horse, US Army Ranger.
While US Army Ranger faded to finish 18th, Rekindling was given a perfect ride by Corey Brown, and at his low weight of 51.5kg, the four-year-old had something still in the tank coming to the clocktower.
He ranged up to Johannes Vermeer, and began to wear the leader down — in the final 100m, Rekindling got the better of his rival, and went on to win by just under half a length, edging out his father and giving Williams his sixth Cup win.
Williams' defending champion, Almandin, was more than 10 lengths back in 12th, as his bid to join Archer, Rain Lover, Think Big, and Makybe Diva as back-to-back winners of the Cup proved beyond him.
Australia only had three locally bred horses in the race, but none finished closer than midfield — Darren Weir's Amelie's Star came 14th, just ahead of the Caulfield Cup-winner Boom Time, and the Nick Olive-trained Single Gaze was further back in 17th.
Despite Williams' record-extending success, Rekindling's win marked the fourth win by an overseas-trained horse since 2010.
Aidan O'Brien's quest, however, still remains unfinished.
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