Gai Waterhouse is striving for more than a place alongside her father, Tommy Smith, on the Sportingbet Blue Diamond honour roll at Caulfield this Saturday, reports Racing Victoria. The Hall of Fame trainer, who has Nayeli in the $1 million Group 1, is attempting something that has not been done since Smith celebrated the last of his three wins in the Diamond, with Bounding Away in 1986.
Waterhouse’s legendary father was the last Sydney-based trainer to win the Blue Diamond trophy with a youngster coming off a Sydney preparation.
Bart Cummings and Peter Snowden are trainers whose main base is in Sydney that have since won the Diamond, with Riva Diva (1992) and Sepoy (2011) respectively, but those youngsters both did all of their pre-Diamond racing in Melbourne.
Kusi, who was prepared by John Hawkes, ‘won’ the Blue Diamond in 2003 but not until several months after the event when Roedean, who was first over the line, was disqualified owing to a positive swab.
And it’s not like New South Wales hasn’t had some handy youngsters have a crack at the Diamond in the last 10 years alone.
Waterhouse has finished second twice, with Wager (2004) and No Looking Back (2012), while Guelph (ninth as second favourite last year), Beneteau (third as favourite in 2010), Real Saga (runner-up as second favourite in 2009), Wonderful World (third in 2006) and Bradbury’s Luck (unplaced as equal second favourite in 2005) are among the others to have tried.
New South Wales probably won’t ever get a better chance to break the drought than this year.
Along with Nayeli, whose two starts have produced a debut victory on Randwick’s Kensington track and Chairman’s Stakes success at Caulfield, favoured pair Rubick and Earthquake boast Sydney form.
The Peter Snowden-trained Earthquake won at Randwick on 9 November, while the Gerald Ryan-trained Rubick didn’t appear until January 25, when he won on debut, also at Randwick.
That big guns both won their respective Blue Diamond Preludes, on 8 February, at their first start in Melbourne.
Those 1100-metre qualifiers have proven the definitive guide to the Blue Diamond. Seventeen of the past 31 Diamond winners have had their final lead-up run in the Prelude, including 11 who won their Prelude.
A further 12 last-start winners have tasted Diamond success in that time and the past three winners – Sepoy, Samaready and Miracles of Life (pictured) – have all maintained an unbeaten streak with their Diamond win, which is something the three Sydney big guns are also trying to achieve.
Sepoy, Samaready and Miracles of Life all started favourite as well, which arrested a horror run for favourite backers that saw six-straight winners salute at double-figure odds.
Rubick reclaimed favouritism from Earthquake after he drew barrier 10, as opposed to gate 15 for the filly, but since 1988 only five winners have started from double-digit gates with only a further six having sprung from a barrier wider than five.
Malaguerra, Golconda, Jabali, Cornrow and Chivalry occupy the five inside starting positions in this year's Blue Diamond Stakes.
Perhaps the only way to split the favourites using history is to look at the battle of the sexes and it is Rubick who gets the nod with the boys having won 26 Diamonds compared to 17 wins by fillies.
The Diamond is just one of many features on Saturday’s Caulfield card and some of the others provide a much stronger statistical lead than the headline event, such as the Sportingbet Oakleigh Plate.
Thirteen of the past 14 winners of the 1100-metre Group 1 have been won by a horse either resuming or with the benefit of just one run back from a spell.
Wide barriers are not the disadvantage punters might expect with half of the past 14 winners starting from barrier 10 or wider, while it has been a disastrous race for favourites with nine of the past 12 winners starting at double-figure odds including seven at $16 or longer.
In contrast, the Cathay Pacific Futurity Stakes has been a great race for punters. The past five editions as a 1400m race – it was run over 1600m from 2006 to 2010 – have been won by the favourite and the two winners prior to that started at $4.20 and $3.80.
Eight of the past 12 runnings at 1400m have been won by three-year-olds, including 2001 when Desert Sky and Mr Murphy dead-heated.
As for the Carlton Draught Peter Young Stakes, 10 of the past 13 winners have come through the Orr Stakes including seven who were second-up as Foreteller is this year.
Melbourne Cup winners Fiorente and Green Moon need to do something only Lucas Cranach has achieved in the past 30 years, which is far back as the Form Focus data goes, as a first-up winner of the 1800m Group 2 event.