Opinion
Over the Easter weekend former champion galloper and one of my all-time favourite horses, Might and Power, passed away.
Perhaps fittingly it was the same weekend of the Queen Elizabeth Stakes, the scene of arguably his finest victory in 1998, in which he trounced a very good field by 10.5 lengths, but it’s a race I wish he would have contested in 1997.
There hasn’t been a horse quite like him to grace the racetrack since.
Graceful he was not. He had a big engine and no brakes. At his best he would go to the front and keep going, breaking the hearts of his opposition as he switched stride a dozen times in the last furlong.
He took racing by storm when he led all the way to bolt in by over seven lengths in the 1997 Caulfield Cup, then defied the challengers in a fast-run Melbourne Cup, holding off Doreimus by the barest of margins.
But it was the preparation beforehand as a three-year-old in the autumn of 1997 that hindsight would like us to revisit.
The prior autumn of 1996 saw a crop of three-year-olds that, as a group of middle-distance horses, haven’t been bettered since. We were treated to some classic encounters as Saintly took the Australian Cup before Octagonal took the Canterbury and Rosehill Guineas, the Tancred and then the Derby for good measure.
Might and Power’s crop of 1997 just didn’t seem to compare. Might and Power himself had come through some restricted races at Canterbury over the summer before going straight to a Group 1 race, the Canterbury Guineas.
There he put in a creditable performance, outsprinted by the classy galloper Intergaze, before a completely forgivable run in the Rosehill Guineas, where another horse fell in front of him.
As an avid video watcher at the time, I couldn’t wait for him to step out in the Derby. At the 1000-metre mark everything was panning out for him, with a quick tempo and Might and Power enjoying a sweet run in transit.
Then, at the 600-metre mark, instead of easing out three-wide, jockey Brian York inexplicable stayed in, hoping for a gap to appear.
In the straight, leader Torbellino drifted out and gave Might and Power the run. As the great horse surged through the field, disaster struck when Torbellino changed direction and flattened the horse. The filly Danendri and Ebony Grosve sprinted past and fought out the finish, while Might and Power picked himself up and ran on for fourth.
And while the luckless Might and Power lost the Derby, the racing public were left with a ‘what could have been’ moment. The other great champ of the era, Octagonal, had made a successful comeback in the autumn of 1997 after a disappointing spring campaign.
After finding himself back in the field in a slowly run Chipping Norton, Shane Dye took the bold step of racing to the lead early and making it a 1000-metre slogfest, defeating the Gai Waterhouse-trained Juggler. He then took out an Australian Cup and a Tancred to add to his many other Group 1s. The champ was back.
And then, on 5 April, Might and Power made his three-year-old rivals in the Frank Packer Plate look like a bunch of picnic horses. But he shouldn’t have been in that race.
Instead he should have lined up against Octagonal in the Queen Elizabeth Stakes a week later. But, a bit like the ill-fated Dulcify and the great Kingstown Town of nearly 20 years prior, the paths of these two great horses were never destined to meet.
It’s all academic of course, but I fancy Might and Power would have beat him and beat him well, partly because Intergaze lowered his colours that day but mainly because I doubt Octagonal’s best could match Might and Power’s. One of racing’s great ‘what ifs’.
He returned in the spring with some mixed performances in Sydney, defeating Alfa with a powerful finish, a second to the mudlark Galactic Valley on a bottomless track and a rare unplaced run in the Epsom.
Then he began his affinity with the flamboyant Jimmy Cassidy. He took him to the front in the Caulfield Cup, blitzed the field by 7.5 lengths and announced him as a champion.
Cassidy then did the same in the 1997 Melbourne Cup, but it was not quite so easy. A bigger weight and plenty of hassle, first from Crying Game and then the dour Linesman, took him a long way from home. But he got his nose out in front when it mattered, right on the line, to see off the 1995 cup winner Doreimus.
The great horse went on to win a Tancred by five lengths, a Queen Elizabeth by a ludicrous 10.5 lengths, a Doomben Cup, Caulfield Stakes and a Cox Plate.
Vale Might and Power, one of the greats of the Australian turf.
What’s your best bet? For great odds on all your favourite sports check out PlayUp. Chances are you’re about to lose. Set a deposit limit.
It’s a pretty good time to be a Tasmanian sports fan right now. After years in the sporting wilderness with not much to celebrate,…
Olympic swimming legend and Australian Sports Commission boss Kieren Perkins has warned that "someone will die" if a multi-sport event that allows athletes to…
In 2015 when heavyweight boxer Tyson Fury beat Wladimir Klitschko, the fighter regarded by many as the ‘Greatest of all time’ in the sport,…
Join Australia's most vibrant online sports community and you have the chance to win $1000. The Roar is the perfect blend of sports reporting,…
Here is a review of our boxers who made a splash in the world rankings over the past year.
After intense debate at Roar HQ, we’ve selected the 23 most controversial moments for 2023.
