Saddling up again
SHAUN Frost came within centimetres of winning the Melbourne Cup with Heartbreak City last year in an emotionally charged race at Flemington.
Twelve months later Frost is set to try again, this time as a part-owner of Melbourne Cup-bound French horse Tiberian.
The Bundall-based financial planner is taking good friend Malcolm Lynch along for the ride as the Gold Coast duo chase one of racing’s biggest prizes on November 7.
Frost, 50, said the plan was to always bring Heartbreak City back in 2017 but the gelding never raced again after last year’s Cup. He was euthanised after breaking a leg in a track gallop in May.
“He was coming back to have another crack at it and would have been a nice chance but by all reports Tiberian is a better horse than Heartbreak City so that has me a bit excited,” Frost said.
“We were in the mounting yard at the Melbourne Cup last year and we honestly thought when he went past us that he had it.
“We were yelling and screaming. It was so exhausting and then to get pipped by the bob of a head was unbelievable.
“Coming down the straight we thought we were going to win the Melbourne Cup.
“It wasn’t a bad effort but when you get that close you would rather come second by a few lengths rather than missing by half a head.”
Getting to one Melbourne Cup as an owner is a feat but this will be Frost’s fourth.
He has previously had Tac De Boistron (2012, 23rd), Seismos (2014, ninth) and Heartbreak City run in the race.
“Hopefully we can go one better this year. It’s a real buzz to be involved,” Frost said.
Frost and Lynch bought a share of about 5 per cent in Tiberian with a Melbournebased friend this year through Darren Dance’s syndication business, Australian Thoroughbred Bloodstock.
Lynch, 57, has been involved in horse ownership for the past 15 years but Tiberian, rated a $17 chance in the Cup, is his only runner now.
And he is excited by the prospects of the six-year-old, who has won six races in France and goes into the Cup without an Australian start.
“Getting to the race is a big achievement,” said Lynch, who runs a business that sells health products.
“It’s all pretty exciting building up to the Cup.
“Seeing it in the betting markets and reading about it, not many people get to be part of the Melbourne Cup. To win it would be a phenomenal feeling.”
Frost and Lynch are hoping to become the third Gold Coast connections to win the Cup in the past four years.
Gold Coast Suns communications manager Stephen Wilson was a part-owner of Prince Of Penzance (2015) while the Henderson family part-owned Fiorente (2013).
Winx wind-down,
WE WERE YELLING AND SCREAMING. IT WAS SO EXHAUSTING AND THEN TO GET PIPPED BY THE BOB OF A HEAD WAS UNBELIEVABLE.
SHAUN FROST
THERE could be as little as 12 months left in the Winx adventure with the mighty mare’s owners conscious of making sure she lives a long healthy life in retirement.
An overseas campaign looks to be on the cards with trainer Chris Waller confirming during the week Winx had been nominated for the Japan Cup and inoculated for the trip.
The Japan Cup will be run in December, while an invitation to next year’s Royal Ascot carnival in Britain is also a certainty.
But Peter Tighe, one of Winx’s ownership trio, declared protecting their star, not chasing more prizemoney or trophies, was their priority.
Winx ($1.15) will become Australia’s greatest stakes winner should she collect a third Cox Plate today and Tighe said anything after that would be a bonus.
“She has nothing to prove. If she wasn’t sound to continue and it all finished tomorrow, well that’s how it is,” he said. “But while it is going well, and we have the opportunity to look to the future and make some plans, that’s what we’ll do.
“But we’re also dealing with an animal, and while she is a finely tuned athlete, things can happen.
“We don’t want to get too far ahead of ourselves, and make plans we can’t commit fully to yet.
“We want to get this program out of the way, then she can go and have a spell and while she does we can make some plans again.”
Tighe said Winx would tell them when she’d had enough and they wouldn’t push her, because they wanted her to retire fit and healthy, and head to the breeding barn happy.
“We make sure she is fit and healthy and well and wants to keep racing. It probably has 12 months to play out,” he said.
“We are not going to race her forever. She has done the right thing by us and the racing public.
“If she puts in two bad runs, that would be the end of it, I think. We’re not going to try to squeeze every last dollar out of her.
“It’s about the mare, protecting her. We want her to live a long, healthy and happy life after racing and become a doting mother.
“She’ll do that better if she’s not run into the ground.”
PETER TIGHE