Neil Dyer, Hawks Bay return to Darwin for Cup tilt

THEY’RE back. Victorian trainer Neil Dyer and a team of 12 horses, including Darwin Cup legend Hawks Bay, have returned to Fannie Bay for another tilt at the Carnival.

Trainer Neil Dyer with his two time Darwin Cup winner Hawks Bay

THEY’RE back. Victorian trainer Neil Dyer and a team of 12 horses, including Darwin Cup legend Hawks Bay, have returned to Fannie Bay for another tilt at the Carnival.

Dyer has made the 7400 kilometres round trip from country Victoria each year since 2008 and has won just about everything the Darwin Cup Carnival has to offer with Hawks Bay, a rising nine-year-old gelding, the star of the show.

Dyer’s impressive run of success includes Darwin Cup wins in 2011 and 2012 with Hawks Bay, a Chief Minister’s Cup, a ROANT Cup, a Metric Mile and 2009 victories in the Guineas and the Derby with, yes you’ve guessed it, Hawks Bay.

But his first visit to the Top End, with Redhead Rage and Palmyra Boy six years ago, did not leave any indication of the success he was going to enjoy at Fannie Bay.

“We arrived last Tuesday afternoon, probably a week early this year,” Dyer said.

“You put up with the journey up here because you know you are going to be (in the Top End) for nine weeks so you can cop four days on the road.

Still the migration north is one of the longest a thoroughbred racehorse endures anywhere in the world.

And all to win the $200,000 Darwin Cup over 2000 metres on the first Monday in August.

It is the sixth time that Hawks Bay has made the trip and, once again, Dyer was proud of the way the horse handled it.

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