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Previous Winners Look to land Melbourne Cup double in 2009 Renewal
Added: (Tue Oct 20 2009)
The 2009 Melbourne Cup is really beginning to buzz with the race taking place on Tuesday 3rd November. Throughout October there have been some key trial races and they will continue through the final weekend in October, before the actual field of 24 runners takes on a more defined look.
The two biggest Melbourne Cup Trials to have taken place so far saw the last two winners of the Melbourne cup, Efficient (2007) and Viewed (2008), win one each. At the beginning of October, EFFICIENT, trained by John Sadler, emphatically won the Turnbull Stakes and in so doing pushing his claims of a second Melbourne Cup to the front of the bookmaker’s minds. He is now a clear favourite to win the race, even though his Turnbull Stakes win cost him a potentially crucial 1kg rise in the weights.
VIEWED, who of course is trained by the legendary trainer, Bart Cummings, was a very impressive winner of the Caulfield Cup on 17th October, but like Efficent he too has been shoved up a kilo for the win in the weights and will also carry 58 kg on the big day. Punters should note that the only horse to carry this weight or more in the last 30 years and win the Melbourne Cup, was the great Makybe Diva, which should give some idea of how difficult the task is facing both Viewed and Efficient. Currently, Efficient is 6/1 in the market, while Viewed is a stable 8/1 and both are sure to be at the top of many pundits Melbourne Cup tips.
Makybe Diva was also the last horse to win the Turnbull Stakes/Melbourne Cup double in the same season. She achieved this feat in 2005. The last horse to complete a same season Caulfield Cup/Melbourne Cup double was the Sheila Laxon trained, Ethereal in 2001.
The next two key trials to take place will be the Cox Plate and the Geelong Cup, which are run during the third/fourth week in October. Once again it was Makybe Diva, in her incredible year of 2005, who was the last to achieve the Cox Plate/Melbourne Cup double, while the last dual winner of the Geelong and Melbourne Cup was the Dermot Weld trained Media Puzzle in 2002.
Amongst the favourites for both the Cox Plate and Melbourne Cup is the useful Speed Gifted, who has strong claims based on his outstanding win in the Metropolitan. Should he run well in the Cox Plate then he will do nothing but improve in time Melbourne Cup Odds for the big race on Tuesday, 3rd November, the day that Australia, like it has been doing for well over 100 years, will yet again, stand still.