OLLIE’S LONG WEIGHT FOR GLORY

AN insatiable appetite for success has fuelled Damien Oliver this week in the absence of calories.

Four-time Caulfield Cup winner Oliver has relied on experience and a bland diet of brown rice, steamed fish and vegetables to drop about 4kg to ride hot chance Delphi in Saturday’s $5m Group 1 major.

Delphi was allotted 52.5kg, but Oliver has permission to ride at 53kg — 500g over the handicap.

Any disadvantage, estimated to be about a length over 2400m, is more than offset by Oliver’s class and race craft. Every part of his 53kg frame will be dedicated to pushing Delphi towards victory.

Not an ounce wasted. It is the lightest Oliver has ridden since 2009 and comes more than 30 years after he wasted to ride Submariner at 49kg to win his first of now 123 Group 1s.

Oliver, who without crowds can be heard shouting at his mounts in tight finishes, was pragmatic about the weight loss last Wednesday, cradling four one-litre bottles — two water and two purple-coloured zero sugar sports drinks — as he left after the Thousand Guineas meet at Caulfield.

“I’ll be sweating plenty out,” Oliver said. “Spring Carnival. I’m a jockey. That’s what I do. We’re in lockdown, can’t do much else.”

Running and smaller portions coupled with experience has helped Oliver meet a daily weight-loss target.

“I’ve been training three times a day and eating brown rice, fruit and vegetables and fish,” he said.

“No salt, no sugar.”

Oliver is likely to wake up on Saturday with “a little bit to go”, in keeping with a typical race-day routine.

“I’m on target, I was 54kg today [Wednesday], so I’m only a kilo off, I’m going all right,” he said.

“I’ve been doing it for a long time so I know how to manage it.”

Oliver, the Melbourne go-to rider for Godolphin, was in line to ride Colette in the Caulfield Cup, but the mare, now running in Saturday’s Group 2 Tristarc Stakes, missed work due to an abscess.

Oliver’s Group 1 record puts his class into perspective. The 49-yearold’s 123 top-flight winners is double his nearest rival in the Caulfield Cup — Craig Williams with 66. The 17 other jockeys in the Caulfield Cup — excluding Oliver — boast a collective 194 Group 1 winners.

Tasmanian-born Craig Newitt, who rides Melbourne Cup-bound She’s Ideel, a noted wet-tracker and likely to be among those having the last crack at the leaders, said Oliver’s commitment also says a bit about Delphi.

Oliver, who last Saturday claimed a second Caulfield Guineas three decades after his first, has turned his attention to breaking a 21-year Caulfield Cup drought.

Delphi has remained second favourite with TAB, drifting from $6.50 to $9, behind Incentivise ($2.50).