This Cup darling wasn’t always Elleegant
I felt lik e it was like riding a little bomb who was going to explode
Ceilidh Johnston
THE first person ever to ride former hothead turned Melbourne Cup sweetheart Verry Elleegant remembers how the young filly was once unrideable and left her with a broken ankle.
Ceilidh Johnston is a trackwork rider for Verry Elleegant’s first trainer Nick Bishara in New Zealand and vividly remembers how it was like “riding a little bomb who was ready to explode” every time she got on the filly’s back.
There were some dramas when she arrived at Ardmore Lodge and plenty more along the way before she was sold to a trans-tasman syndicate to do her future racing in Australia.
“I first got on her when she was a yearling after being broken in but she was simply not rideable so she had to be sent back to be broken in again,” Johnston said.
“You could simply not get
on her and she would just go into a buck.
“When she came back she was better but she was always a really hot little filly, full of energy.
“I felt like it was like riding a little bomb who was going to explode. She wasn’t naughty or anything but she was just full of beans and full of energy.
“I’ve got a broken ankle at the moment and funnily enough Verry Elleegant once did the same thing to me, she just was walking down the middle of the track one day and took fright at something and I ended up with a broken ankle.
“She was so headstrong that when I galloped her I would spend another lap trying to pull her up.”
Johnston rides trackwork during the morning and is a solicitor at a legal firm in the afternoon although she now has another broken ankle from a trackwork incident.
Verry Elleegant raced three times in New Zealand, finishing runner-up at her first start at Te Rapa before winning the next two when ridden by then apprentice Rowena Smyth.
Ironically, the winner in Verry Elleegant’s debut race was a two-year-old called Cyber Attack which was owned by Johnston’s boss at the legal firm.
Johnston may not quite have dared to dream Verry Elleegant would win six Group 1s in Australia including the Caulfield Cup, and be up near the top of the pops in betting as an $11 chance in the 2020 Melbourne Cup, but she knew the young filly was something out of the box. “She had stamina like I had never experienced in any other horse,” Johnston said. “She wasn’t much to look at but if you got her going on the track she was a very strong filly and she just had this massive stride and covered so much ground with her stride.
“She was day one.
“Zeds (horses sired by NZ stallion Zed) are always better when they get older. They are a bit immature when they are younger and I think that showed a lot in her early racing career and how she was racing with her head up and erratically. a freak from
“She has never been the most glamorous looking horse but when she races she gets the job done.”
Johnston has retained a keen interest in Verry Elleegant’s career and was delighted when the talented galloper ended up in the care of Chris Waller, a former Kiwi.
The 25-year-old hopes she can one day reunite with her favourite horse and in the meantime she will be cheering her like crazy from across the Tasman on Tuesday.
“I always see little bits and pieces of vision of Elle (Verry Elleegant) with Chris Waller’s staff and I’ve got in contact with a few staff and strappers and said thanks for looking after her so well,” Johnston said. “I hope I can catch up with her one day down the track, I’ve never ridden a horse like her.”
Still riding the Verry Elleegant wave is original trainer Bishara, who is part of the original ownership syndicate which has retained 20 per cent share.
He has also never quite seen a young horse like the early version of Verry Elleegant.
“She was very raw but she had a huge motor,” Bishara said. “We worked her in the sand and it was the middle of winter and the sand was quite deep and she came back and wouldn’t blow a candle out.
“A two-year-old filly should have been having a puff, but she had that motor and stamina and the will to win.
“She has always had a high head carriage, that’s just her, it looks like she is not relaxing but jockeys lately have been very happy with her.”
Bishara has booked several tables at Ellerslie racecourse on Melbourne Cup day to cheer the mare on from afar.
“We will have about 40 of our closest friends at races that day,” he said. “I will need a wheelchair or an ambulance to get home if we can win the Melbourne Cup.” a