IF THERE was a feeling of inevitability about yesterday's Cox Plate, then Tuesday week's Melbourne Cup has an inescapable conclusion following the astonishing Cox Plate victory yesterday of So You Think. Bart Cummings already has both hands on a 13th gold cup, reports the Sunday Age.It says: It was not so much the time So You Think ran - two minutes 7.45 seconds - or the 1╝-length margin, but the manner in which he dominated his opposition to win his second Cox Plate two weeks before his fourth

IF THERE was a feeling of inevitability about yesterday's Cox Plate, then Tuesday week's Melbourne Cup has an inescapable conclusion following the astonishing Cox Plate victory yesterday of So You Think. Bart Cummings already has both hands on a 13th gold cup, reports the Sunday Age.

It says: It was not so much the time So You Think ran - two minutes 7.45 seconds - or the 1╝-length margin, but the manner in which he dominated his opposition to win his second Cox Plate two weeks before his fourth birthday.

Last year, he tricked his rivals by leading and dashing away as an unknown with a light weight, but yesterday he boldly sat up outside the leader, More Joyous, for all to see and for all to aim at. Then he left them wallowing with a burst of speed around the final turn at Moonee Valley that sent the huge crowd into raptures.

''He's the horse of a generation,'' chief handicapper Greg Carpenter said after the race, while Nicholas Hall, who rode Zipping, lamented that he had run into ''the next Phar Lap''.

''I think he's the best I've seen,'' Carpenter said. ''He could rewrite racing history. Cox Plate winners have done it [win a Melbourne Cup 10 days later] before, like Phar Lap, Rising Fast, Makybe Diva and Saintly, but Phar Lap and Saintly had won Derbies, Rising Fast had won the Caulfield Cup and Makybe Diva had won two Melbourne Cups. This horse has never gone beyond today's distance and if he can win a Melbourne Cup [over 3200 metres], he will achieve something that none of those champions of the past did.''

Five-time Cox Plate winner Cummings, who turns 83 in a few weeks, confirmed that the Melbourne Cup was now firmly on the agenda for the horse who has won two Cox Plates in his first 10 starts and earned $4.61 million.

''I think he'll go there,'' he said. ''He seems to like it [racing] and I don't mind it either.''

But for Cummings, his Melbourne Cup arsenal does not end with So You Think. Just under an hour before So You Think's unforgettable win, Precedence, who like So You Think is also part-owned by Malaysian millionaire Dato Tan Chin Nam, put himself in the running for a Cup spot when he won the Cathay Pacific Moonee Valley Cup and earned himself a second 1.5 kilogram penalty.

The penalty pushed Precedence to 30th in order for a start in the 24-horse field and is now almost certain to clinch a spot for which he is equal third favourite at $12. On Thursday, when asked to nominate his best chance of landing the Melbourne Cup, Cummings named two - Precedence and So You Think.

So You Think, who started $1.50 yesterday, is now the $3.20 favourite for the Melbourne Cup. He is likely to run in Saturday's Mackinnon Stakes at Flemington to round out his preparation.