THE 2007 Melbourne Cup winner Efficient will have to earn his way into the field for November's 150th running despite changes to conditions for the race announced yesterday by the Victoria Racing Club, reports The Age newspaper.Its report adds: The VRC said yesterday that this year's Turnbull Stakes winner would pass the first ballot clause for the Melbourne Cup, but no allowances were made for last year's Turnbull winner Efficient, who finds himself stranded outside all balloting clauses as his
THE 2007 Melbourne Cup winner Efficient will have to earn his way into the field for November's 150th running despite changes to conditions for the race announced yesterday by the Victoria Racing Club, reports The Age newspaper.
Its report adds: The VRC said yesterday that this year's Turnbull Stakes winner would pass the first ballot clause for the Melbourne Cup, but no allowances were made for last year's Turnbull winner Efficient, who finds himself stranded outside all balloting clauses as his 2007 Cup victory is no longer recognised for the purposes of the ballot.
Owner Lloyd Williams said yesterday that Efficient, who has been scratched from three Melbourne Cups due to injury, would attempt to qualify for a Melbourne Cup start by again winning the Turnbull Stakes or by running in the first three placings in the Cox Plate and Mackinnon Stakes.
''It's a long way out still but that seems the best way to go with him,'' he said. ''He is most unlikely to run in a mile-and-a-half [2400 metres] race like a Caulfield Cup on the way through.''
Efficient, who will be a seven-year-old next spring, has been prepared for four Melbourne Cups but has contested only one. In 2006 he was scratched on Cup morning, three days after his win in the Victoria Derby. He won in 2007, but joint problems have ruled him out the past two years.