THE connections of Dunaden might have emerged as big winners after snaring Sunday's Hong Kong Vase (2400 metres) on the way home to France, but while the Victoria Racing Club will not see a cent of the prizemoney, the Melbourne Cup winner's victory has added prestige to the race that no amount of money can buy, reports The Age. It says: Last year, Americain was rated the second top-weighted stayer in the world after winning the Cup and running third in the Vase and when the end-of-season ranking
THE connections of Dunaden might have emerged as big winners after snaring Sunday's Hong Kong Vase (2400 metres) on the way home to France, but while the Victoria Racing Club will not see a cent of the prizemoney, the Melbourne Cup winner's victory has added prestige to the race that no amount of money can buy, reports The Age.
It says: Last year, Americain was rated the second top-weighted stayer in the world after winning the Cup and running third in the Vase and when the end-of-season rankings are released early next year, both Americain and Dunaden are likely to be at the head of affairs for the stayers in 2011.
The efforts of the Melbourne Cup quinella of Dunaden and Red Cadeaux to go on and win and run equal third respectively in the Vase reinforced to the racing world that the Cup is indeed the world staying championship.
''Many people have still been saying that the Melbourne Cup is just a two-mile handicap for group 2 or 3 stayers, but that is wrong and I think the result on Sunday changed that,'' said Racing Victoria's international recruiter Leigh Jordon.
Jordon said he believed the quality of the international runners in this year's Melbourne Cup had been the strongest ever and it was gratifying to see the two best-performed runners subsequently take that form onto the international stage.
''We felt it was the best field we had ever had, but Dunaden has now been able to take that form into an international group 1 race at weight-for-age at 2400 metres and with Red Cadeaux also running so well here, they have proved how good the Cup field was,'' Jordon said.
The Hong Kong International meeting was an undisputed success this year with the crowd rising 24 per cent, turnover up 17 per cent and the Hong Kong government collecting just under $A17 million in taxes from the day. It is billed as the ''World Turf Championships'' but this year was unable to get a representative from either Australia or North America.