NEWS
Cummings' experience lifts lightly raced So You Think in Cox Plate
Posted: Saturday, October 24, 2009 3:23 PM
by Mike Curry
For most trainers, a run like the one Bart Cummings is currently in the midst of during the Melbourne Spring Racing Carnival would be the defining stretch of a career.
But for the legendary Australian trainer, nicknamed the “Cups King”, the current hot streak is simply proof that experience is paramount when preparing a horse for career-best performance at the opportune time.
Cummings, 81, won his fourth Tatts W. S. Cox Plate (Aus-G1) when inexperienced three-year-old So You Think scored a front-running victory on Saturday at Moonee Valley.
The win was the third Group 1 victory in three weeks for Cummings, who picked up his record-extending seventh win in the BMW Caulfield Cup (Aus-G1) a week ago with Viewed. Cummings also won the David Jones Toorak Handicap (Aus-G1) with Allez Wonder on October 10.
"We did it again," Cummings, who took out his trainer’s license in 1953 and has won a stakes every year since ‘58, told the Australian Associated Press. "You can't buy experience and I've got a bit of that."
Last year, Viewed gave the Hall of Famer his 12th win in the Emirates Airline Melbourne Cup (Aus-G1), also a record. The 2008 Melbourne Cup was Cummings’ milestone 250th career Group 1 win. Viewed showed he was back in form and a top threat for this year’s Melbourne Cup with the Caulfield Cup score, but Saturday belonged to So You Think.
The High Chapparal (Ire) colt entered Australia’s weight-for-age championship off a fifth-place finish on October 10 in The Age Caulfield Guineas (Aus-G1) in which he broke poorly and rallied from off the pace. So You Think made only his fifth career start in the 2,040-meter (10.14-furlong) Cox Plate, but Cummings believed he had the talent to compete in the race.
"He may be only a three-year-old but he's a big, strong horse with above-normal ability, so I thought he should run," Cummings told the Australian Associated Press. "I told [jockey] Glen Boss to try to have him forward but didn't expect him to be up there. But in the end he did it pretty easily."
Boss did not expect to control the pace, but when So You Think broke alertly and flashed early speed he let him go to the front with Caulfield Guineas third-place finisher Manhattan Rain stalking from second.
Turning into the straight, So You Think had plenty of stamina in reserve and powered to a dominant 2 1/2-length victory at 9.40-to-1 odds. He completed the distance in 2:03.98 on turf rated as dead.
"I went in with a very open mind," Boss said. "He is a bit raw and immature and I thought if I could ride him a good race he could run third. … But after 20 meters, the decision was made. He relaxed and no one bothered him.
"What about Bart? Unbelievable," Boss added. "I had to pinch myself at the top of the straight, I just couldn't believe it."
Cummings, who was inducted into the Australian Racing Hall of Fame with the inaugural class in 2001, also won the Cox Plate with *Taj Rossi (1973), Saintly (‘96), and Dane Ripper (‘97).
Manhattan Rain finished willingly for second, a neck in front of last year’s Cox Plate runner-up, Zipping. El Segundo finished fourth and heavy favorite Whobegotyou was sixth after winning the Caulfield Yalumba Stakes (Aus-G1) on October 10.
Boss was handed a ten-day ban for forcing an opponent into tight quarters early in the Cox Plate, and he was fined $1,000 for his enthusiastic gesture of victory before So You Think crossed the finish line.
Mike Curry is a Thoroughbred Times TODAY editor
