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If racing fans wore jockey’s silks to the races just as footy fans wear their team’s jumper to the football, whose colours would you don at the track?
For me the answer is simple. I’d wear the It’s A Dundeel blue and gold. And it’s not because of his incredible ability to always win a close race and it’s not because he’s my favourite horse – he isn’t.
And it’s not because his colours are the best either. No, it’s a tribute to his owners putting the interests of racing above their own.
Because, last season, when the connections of the nation’s other two great three-year-olds – Pierro and All Too Hard – were preparing arrangements for early retirements to stud, the owners of Triple Crown winning three-year-old It’s A Dundeel declared they wanted to race their colt on.
And they didn’t have to.
A better decision they haven’t made – for themselves and for racing. It’s A Dundeel secured a lucrative stud career with his fifth and most important Group 1 victory last weekend in the Underwood Stakes (1800m, Group 1, weight-for-age).
Never before have his stocks been so high than after that famous defeat of the previously unbeaten Atlantic Jewel.
So, like those privileged owners who raced Pierro and All Too Hard, the connections of It’s A Dundeel will enjoy a healthy payday.
The son of High Chaparral will stand at Arrowfield Stud in the NSW Hunter Valley at the end of his career.
But until the New Zealand stallion runs his last race, his owners will have full ownership of It’s A Dundeel.
There is also the option, and trainer Murray Bake likes the idea, that It’s A Dundeel travels to Paris next spring for a tilt at the 2014 Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe (2400m, Group 1, weight-for-age) in a bid to win what is perhaps the most prestigious race in the world.
Should the trip be made, the blue and gold silks worn by Kiwi hoop James McDonald will flap proudly in the French wind, along with New Zealand flags that will inevitably be carried into Longchamp by It’s A Dundeel’s travelling fan-base.
It will be a great moment in the long and rich history of New Zealand racing and perhaps just reward for deciding to race the exciting colt on after his outstanding three-year-old year.
Right now, Australian racing is benefitting from the presence of It’s A Dundeel. Atlantic Jewel is the headline horse in what promises to be a classic Spring Carnival but her vanquisher is the reason for so much interest and excitement within the industry today.
This year’s Cox Plate (2040m, Group 1, weight-for-age) could rival that of 1992 – when punters who bet in the Cox Plate had a choice of eight or nine champions to back when doing the form.
There won’t be eight or nine champions this year but I reckon we may have six or seven genuinely great horses lining up.
Don’t forget it is only because It’s A Dundeel has proven it possible to beat Atlantic Jewel that we think to dream about such possibilities.
If the mare was still unbeaten, the whole spring would be revolve around one horse in the same way Black Caviar dominated headlines in the 2013 autumn.
And while racing benefits in the short term from the media interest a dominant champion creates, it is races like the 1992 Cox Plate – whose legend will outlive those who were at the Moonee Ponds track to watch – that racing really thrives.
Those races form so much of racing’s fabric and its history.
At the weekend, Samaready, who incidentally is owned in the same interests as All Too Hard, and Rebel Dane, tasted Group 1 success in the Moir Stakes (1200m, weight-for-age) and Rupert Clarke (1400m, handicap) respectively.
Both belong to the vintage age group that will forever be highlighted by It’s A Dundeel, All Too Hard and Pierro.
On Sunday, a four-year-old named Bass Strait who could not hold a match-stick against It’s A Dundeel in the autumn, catapulted into Caulfield Cup (2400m, Group 1, handicap) calculations with a strong victory in the Open handicap (1700m).
Next weekend, Hawkspur and Toydini – four-year-olds who were not good enough to race in Group 1s against the likes of All Too Hard and Pierro – will be the focus of their two races for entirely different reasons.
Hawkspur, having his first start in Melbourne in the Turnbull (2000m, Group 1, set weights and penalties), is the current Caulfield Cup favourite.
Toydini, on the other hand, will attempt to join 1992 Cox Plate winner Super Impose on the honour roll of the Epsom Handicap (1600m, Group 1) and he will be sent out the favourite.
There has not been such interest in a spring four-year-old group since 1996 when Saintly, Octagonal, Filante and Nothin’ Leica Dane tried to build off their domination of the three-year-old classics.
Saintly achieved glory in the Cox Plate and Melbourne Cup (3200m, Group 1, handicap).
Octagonal, the Triple Crown winner, won the Underwood. That means 2013 Triple Crown winner It’s A Dundeel repeated history with his Underwood win.
And Filante, romped in the Epsom by a widening margin. Ian Craig, the now retired Sydney race-caller, described it perfectly – “Filante is giving them a mud bath,” he declared. Those are the words that ring in my ears when I think of that October annihilation.
For so many great three-year-olds, the crowning glory happens at four. It’s A Dundeel’s connections know all about that. We thank them as fans for the chance to share in that glory.
But, All Too Hard and Pierro’s owners did not give their colts the chance at that sort of spring glory. Instead, they must watch as inferior four-year-olds like Toydini and Hawkspur win headlines their colts would have hogged if given the chance.
In all likelihood All Too Hard and Pierro would have arrested a lot of media interest from Atlantic Jewel.
And when they won, their stud values would have undoubtedly increased.
I don’t think it’s a big call to say the decision to retire so early was too conservative and probably wrong.
When the day comes that racing fans decide to wear their favourite silks to the track, I will chose It’s A Dundeel’s. And I doubt I will be alone.
But I don’t expect many to come in Pierro’s red and blue or All Too Hard’s green and white. They represent everything the average fan dislikes in modern racing.
They represent the decision to retire a season too early rather than a defeat too late. They represent racing for money rather than racing for Group 1 glory.
And they represent the promising, instead of the champion.
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