The Everest slot drama can be a (Giga) Kick in the guts

It’s the high-stakes deals and cut-throat moves behind the scenes that capture the imagination and make the race to get into The Everest as fascinating as the race itself. This is the story of just one of this year’s slots.

The Everest is unique in racing, with each of the 12 $700,000 slots generating their own dramas long before the horses reach the track.

This is the story of just one of this year’s slots: the one owned by bloodstock agent James Harron.

Harron began his campaign for The Everest full of confidence, having secured last year’s winner Giga Kick for a second year. The deal was done and contract inked with last year’s winning team – Giga Kick and billionaire owner Jonathan Munz, trainer Clayton Douglas and jockey Craig Williams all set to repeat their roles.

Only that did not work out as planned and with just weeks to go before the jump in the $20m race, there was a major upset with the hot favourite.

Giga Kick was entered in a preparatory race, the Group 2 McEwen Stakes at Moonee Valley in Victoria when jockey Craig Williams missed the start.

Jockey Craig Williams on Giga Kick takes at the 2022 TAB Everest. Picture: Mark Evans/Getty Images

His “gut buster” run to make up time enraged the owner’s racing manager Rod Douglas.

Williams was booted out of the saddle for The Everest and the world’s best jockey, James McDonald, drafted in.

Then it was found Giga Kick had strained a muscle and had to be pulled out of the race. It left Harron’s carefully-crafted plans in tatters and the slot wide open.

THE SLOT HOLDER: JAMES HARRON

Slot holder James Harron’s build-up to The TAB Everest had been going so smoothly for months – then with less than three weeks until the big race he was scrambling to find another runner.

Harron’s predicament highlights the compelling nature and unpredictability of the world’s richest race on turf.

Can pick em: Bloodstock agent James Harron, with a brown colt, for which he paid $900,000 at the Magic Millions horse sales. Picture: Lyndon Mechielsen/The Australian

After agreeing to terms with owner Jonathon Munz to run defending champion Giga Kick in his slot earlier this year, Harron seemed set to win The Everest for a third time in just seven years.

Harron had successfully chosen the unheralded Giga Kick 12 months ago before his famous Everest win and also Redzel, the race’s inaugural winner in 2017.

Giga Kick has developed into the nation’s No. 1 ranked sprinter since his win in The Everest last year and was the long-time race favourite only to be a forced withdrawal due to a muscle injury.

“I only heard about the news of Giga Kick’s injury on the morning he was taken out of The Everest, it was quite a shock,’’ Harron said.

“But it’s good they are putting Giga Kick first, he’s a very important horse and I’m sure he will be back to compete in these big races down the track.

“These things happen with horses, you just have to take a break and have a good think about the situation.’’

Cylinder wins the Run To The Rose at Rosehill Gardens on September 9. The brilliant colt has been drafted in by James Harron to fill his Everest slot. Picture: Bradley Photos

Harron didn’t have to think long. Later that same day, Godolphin’s brilliant colt Cylinder ran a brave third in the Group 1 Golden Rose and there was a “new” race among those vacant slot holders to secure the three-year-old for The Everest.

Within three days, Harron had negotiated a deal and he is hopeful Cylinder can become the third three-year-old after Giga Kick (2022) and Yes Yes Yes (2019) to win The Everest.

”He’s a seasoned performer,’’ Harron said.

Cylinder gives Godolphin two chances in The Everest, after it was announced dual Group 1 winner In Secret would race in their slot.

THE TRAINER: CLAYTON DOUGLAS

Former jockey Clayton Douglas came out of nowhere with his three-year-old chestnut gelding Giga Kick to land a spot in The Everest just two weeks before race day last year.

As he started the year the thought of securing a berth in the world’s richest race on turf was the furthest thing from his mind.

But as the unfancied but unbeaten Giga Kick began to see off much more expensive and better bred horses the whispers that a slot might be available began.

“James Herron is a very astute judge,” Douglas said. “He has had a winner before with Redzel so he knew what horse he needed.”

Harron called owner Jonathan Munz’s racing manager Rod Douglas and the deal making began.

2022 The Everest winning trainer Clayton Douglas with Giga Kick at his Mornington stables. Picture: David Geraghty

“There’s a lot of back and forward … It’s not just ‘do you want to take an Everest slot and away we go’,” Douglas said. “It’s a race where it’s a negotiation with a lot of prize money on the table so it takes a little bit for everyone to be happy.”

Weeks later Douglas, just 28-years-old and starting out as a trainer, found himself on a boat on Sydney Harbour for the barrier draw with the other trainers and slot holders.

“It was phenomenal – I was rubbing shoulders with Chris Waller and the likes,” Douglas said. “To think that my little horse that had won four races at the time was taking on Nature Strip, a superstar of the sport, it was pretty scary stuff. Pretty nerve wracking for me.”

Not only did Giga Kick take on Nature Strip but he ran down the legendary champion, winner of The Everest in 2021, from a lead just 50 metres from the finishing post.

Regular jockey Craig Williams was ecstatic.

That win saw Harron exercise his right to put Giga Kick into the slot for The Everest in 2023. It was one of the first horses announced and sat comfortably as favourite as other slot holders sought to find a horse quick enough to beat him.

Douglas planned a series of races to deliver Giga Kick in top form on Everest day. The lead up began in earnest with the Group 2 McEwen Stakes at Moonee Valley, ahead of the Premiere Stakes at Royal Randwick two weeks before The Everest.

That’s racing, says Clayton Douglas, pictured with 2022 winner Giga Kick and the Everest trophy. Giga Kick is injured and won’t line up this year. Picture: David Caird

But the missed start which saw Craig Williams lose the ride on Giga Kick was just the start of Giga Kick’s dramas this year.

Big name jockeys including Zac Purton from Hong Kong, Nash Rawiller, Mark Zahra and Blake Shinn all called up to throw their hats into the ring for the ride, but it was James McDonald who was to take the saddle.

But the damage was done.

Giga Kick was pulled from the Premiere Stakes, and then from The Everest with a torn gluteal muscle from that ill-fated ride.

“I have arguably the best horse in the country, who was set to have a great spring running in races carrying $30 million in prizemoney, but unfortunately he is going to the paddock. That‘s racing,” Douglas said afterwards.

THE JOCKEYS: CRAIG WILLIAMS AND JAMES MCDONALD

Craig Williams and James McDonald have ridden the last two The Everest winners but both champion jockeys are still searching for a ride in this year’s big race because of the Giga Kick injury.

Williams had been Giga Kick’s regular rider and won The Everest last year on the gelding before being dumped in controversial circumstances after the sprinter’s first-up Moir Stakes loss.

McDonald was riding Nature Strip, the 2021 The Everest winner, but when the sprint superstar was retired, he was offered the ride on Giga Kick.

When that horse suffered an injury setback, it left McDonald and Williams looking for new rides in The Everest just two weeks out from the big race.

McDonald gave an exclusive interview for The Daily Telegraph’s new six-part documentary, The Race, providing a revealing insight into what it’s like in the jockeys’ room just prior to the big race.

Craig Williams — who won The Everest aboard Giga Kick last year — is still without a ride this year. Picture: Getty Images

Champion jockey James McDonald is also yet to lock in an Everest mount after Giga Kick’s withdrawal. Picture: Jeremy Ng/Getty Images

“Everything just goes silent, it’s dead quiet in the room in the half-hour before the race,’’ McDonald said.

“Everyone’s got their head in their paper (form guides) and just going through their last little bit of preparation in terms of how you think the race is going to be run.

“I’m most nervous in that 30 minutes before The Everest but as soon as you hop on that horse, it’s … like my safe place.’’

The famous Randwick 1200m course will take The Everest field less than 70 seconds to complete so there is no margin for rider error, McDonald said.

“If you miss the kick in The Everest, it’s almost over,’’ he said.

“These are the best 12 sprinters, basically anywhere in the world, and it’s so hard to make up that margin. In a two mile race when something happens, you’ve still got time to try and rectify it, to make good out of a bad situation. But The Everest doesn’t give you that chance, you have to get it right.’’

THE OWNER: JONATHON MUNZ

There was nothing sexy or even vaguely promising about Giga Kick in the beginning.

Billionaire owner Jonathon Munz listened to his racing manager Rod Douglas who suggested they put the horse with his nephew, former jockey Clayton Douglas, who was just starting out as a trainer.

Munz is the influential chairman of the Victorian Thoroughbred Owners Association and has been vocal in criticising Racing Victoria for its “hotchpotch of poorly conceived ideas and thought bubbles” including the suggestion of giving jockeys Formula One style earpieces.

But when it comes to talking about his own racing operation he leaves it to Rod Douglas.

“Jonathan races a lot of horses and this guy (Giga Kick) was one of the last to be placed with a trainer,” Clayton Douglas said.

Trainer Clayton Douglas and his uncle, racing manager Rod Douglas, after a Giga Kick win in 2022. Picture: Vince Caligiuri/Getty Images

“He is by an unfashionable stallion in Scissor Kick and out of an older mare. My uncle said to Jonathan, ‘Why don‘t you give Clayton the horse and see if we can get him going. We might sell him down the track as a trade horse, sell him off a trial or something’.”

Not long after that they realised they had a winner on their hands. Storming to victory in The Everest last year looked like just the start.

He was signed up for a second year by slot holder James Harron and looked like the horse everyone else had to beat.

But the preparation for The TAB Everest this year went horribly wrong with a poorly-timed by regular jockey Craig Williams in the McEwen Stakes at Moonee Valley and

Rod Douglas was furious. “I’d have strangled him at Moonee Valley,” Douglas said.

“I’d have strangled him with my bare hands, I’d have strangled him in the mounting yard. There’s no excuse for what he did.

Billionaire owner Jonathan Munz, who was eyeing Everest number 2 until the Giga Kick incident.

“It wasn’t all about winning that race, he knows where we’re at with the horse. He knows he’s three weeks until the Premiere (Stakes) and five weeks to The Everest.

“It just doesn’t make any sense to what he did. Inexcusable and we’ll see what plays out. He knew where we were at and that’s the bit that’s hard to cope with.”

Douglas was fined $1500 for those comments on radio that the Racing Victoria stewards said were “detrimental to the interests of racing”.

He called Williams later to apologise but did not step back from insisting the hoop be taken off the ride.

The run had left Giga Kick with a torn muscle and he had to be pulled first from the Premiere Stakes and then The Everest.

“I have arguably the best horse in the country, who was set to have a great spring running in races carrying $30 million in prizemoney, but unfortunately he is going to the paddock. That‘s racing,” Douglas said afterwards.