Melbourne Cup winner Green Moon will have to repeat the deeds of French stayer Dunaden if he is to win the Group 1 $2.65m BMW Caulfield Cup (2400m) at Caulfield on October 19 after receiving topweight of 58kg when weights were released today.
Green Moon winning the 2012 Melbourne Cup at Flemington. Photo by Race Horse Photos Australia.
Dunaden won the 2011 Group 1 $6m Emirates Melbourne Cup (3200m) at Flemington before returning to Australia last year to score a stunning win with 58kg in the Caulfield Cup.
But Racing Victoria Executive General Manager of Racing Greg Carpenter looks likely to raise the Caulfield Cup weights at acceptance with prominent owner Lloyd Williams looking to the Group 1 $3m Sportingbet Cox Plate (2040m) at Moonee Valley on October 26 for Green Moon.
The topweight has to carry 58kg so if Green Moon doesn’t run, the next in the weights to accept will have their weight raised to 58kg.
Williams’ classy import Sea Moon and Melbourne Cup runner-up Red Cadeaux have been weighted on 57kg while William’s Sydney Cup winner Mourayan has been given 55kg.
“Only five Melbourne Cup winners have gone on to win the Caulfield Cup in 135 years, but two of those have been in recent times in Dunaden and Viewed who have a similar weight profile to Green Moon should he take up the challenge,” Carpenter told Racing Victoria.
“Sea Moon required considerable thought as the highest weighted non-Group 1 winner, but he was an impressive winner of the Group 2 Hardwicke Stakes at Royal Ascot in June 2012 over Dunaden and Red Cadeaux and has been placed in an English St Leger.”
The Mark Kavanagh trained Super Cool is the highest weighted four year old on 55kg after being the first three year old to win the Group 1 $1m Darley Australian Cup (2000m) at Flemington last Autumn since the mighty Saintly won in 1996.
“Super Cool was the first three-year-old since Saintly to win the Australian Cup and is one of only three to do so. Saintly was allotted 55.5kg in the Caulfield Cup as a four-year-old, but did not run, instead winning the Cox Plate and Melbourne Cup,” Carpenter said.
Kavanagh has set Super Cool for the Caulfield Cup and more than pleased with his first up third behind glamour stablemate Atlantic Jewel in the Group 1 $350,000 New Zealand Bloodstock Memsie Stakes (1400m) at Caulfield last Saturday.
“That was his best first up run ever. That was good effort,” Kavanagh said after the Memsie Stakes.
“He looks like a Caulfield Cup horse to me,” he later told the Herald Sun.
Gai Waterhouse’s highly rated Melbourne Cup runner-up Fiorente has 55.5kg while Metal Bender on the same weight is the highest weighted horse from Chris Waller’s ten entries.
The rest of Waller’s strong Caulfield Cup hopefuls include Bayrir, Beaten Up and Foreteller all on 54.5kg with Queensland Derby winner Hawkspur on 53kg and Australian Oaks winner Royal Descent on 53.5kg.
Imported grey Manighar is the highest weighted of Peter Moody’s eleven entrants on 56.5kg.
Super Cool currently heads the Caulfield Cup market at $10 ahead of Fiorente at $11 and the David Hayes trained import Jet Away ($13) who was allocated 53.5kg.
Waller has the next three in the betting, Royal Descent at $15, Hawkspur at $16 and Beaten Up at $18.
