Wayne Hawkes column: How to improve Cox Plate quality, and solve Caulfield Cup-The Everest clash
The Everest and Caulfield Cup is already a blockbuster day but Wayne Hawkes has a few suggestions to make it even better. Plus, his thoughts on Master Of Wine’s chances in the Cox Plate.
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It wouldn’t be Cox Plate week without the annual debate over who gets into the field. And who should be left out.
It’s no different this year with the decision to promote Grandslam, the winner of only one race (a Benchmark 66 at Morphettville), into the field after his owners paid $200,000 as a late entry fee.
Lightly-raced three-year-olds have always shaped the race.
Octagonal won the Cox Plate in 1995 as a three-year-old, Shamus Award won it as a maiden and Adelaide was a northern hemisphere three-year-old when he won it.
The history of the race paints a compelling picture around the three-year-olds.
That said, I would have Buckhurst in the field.
Grandslam ran third at his last start in the Caulfield Guineas and there’s a clear link between running well at Caulfield in a Group 1 and then performing at the Valley.
All Too Hard won the Guineas before running second in the Cox Plate, Shamus Award ran third at Caulfield and won the Cox Plate and Octagonal did the same.
In my opinion, the debate over who gets in and who doesn’t is one we don’t need to have.
Do we really need 14 in the field? I think 12 is ideal and, at that number, the committee is justified in hand-picking the field.
The race is all about quality, not quantity.
We’ll have Master Of Wine in the race and he’s got an outstanding gate in barrier one. From there, he’ll go to sleep on the fence with cover. It’s perfect.
I wouldn’t be too critical of his Caulfield Cup run. He sat outside the leader Dashing Willoughby and was beaten 4½ lengths in 10th place.
Dashing Willoughby ran last, beaten 27 lengths. That tells you how well Master Of Wine ran.
In a year when we had the chance to experiment – and didn’t – Chris Waller made a very good point after the Caulfield Cup.
He raised the issue of the recurring clash between the Caulfield Cup and The Everest and suggested it might be time for The Everest to be run at night.
The other part of his wishlist was for Racing NSW to organise a flight from Melbourne to Sydney to get trainers back to back up to The Everest.
Why not add jockeys to the equation so we have the best riders available in both states on the same day.
And if you want to get really innovative and do something a bit crazy, why not fill the plane with owners and punters?
It’s already a blockbuster day but why not make the timing better for everybody? That way, everybody would win.
I hope Herald Sun punters followed Wild Planet at Caulfield on Saturday. We haven’t decided where he’ll go next – either the Cantala or back to Sydney for a race on Derby Day – but he’s obviously in great form and worth following.
Good luck.
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