Melbourne Cup favourite Septimus has escaped a penalty for his Irish St Leger win and is set to make the trip to Australia pending final approval of quarantine arrangements.Trainer Aidan O'Brien is waiting for Australian officials to give the nod for his horses to spend pre-quarantine at Ballydoyle before travelling."Septimus seems to be fine and we just have the quarantine issue to address, and I hope to find out about that early next week," O'Brien told the Racing Post."The plan is to look at

Melbourne Cup favourite Septimus has escaped a penalty for his Irish St Leger win and is set to make the trip to Australia pending final approval of quarantine arrangements.

Trainer Aidan O'Brien is waiting for Australian officials to give the nod for his horses to spend pre-quarantine at Ballydoyle before travelling.

"Septimus seems to be fine and we just have the quarantine issue to address, and I hope to find out about that early next week," O'Brien told the Racing Post.

"The plan is to look at the Melbourne Cup. We'd love to go."

Septimus was installed as favourite for the Melbourne Cup after he beat stablemate New Zealand by 13 lengths in the Group One St Leger at the Curragh.

However, Racing Victoria chief handicapper Greg Carpenter questioned the quality of the opposition when he decided not to penalise Septimus who has 58.5kg in the Cup.

"While Septimus was visually very impressive on Saturday in winning by 13 lengths, given the level of opposition the performance does not warrant a penalty for the Emirates Melbourne Cup," Carpenter said.

"The runner-up, New Zealand, had won a maiden at Killarney at his previous run after being soundly beaten in maiden company at his two previous starts this season.

"The third placegetter Red Moloney was beaten 13 lengths in a Listed Race at his previous outing and is yet to win a race at Group level."

But Carpenter did consider the O'Brien-trained Honolulu's victory in the Group Two Doncaster Cup worthy of a penalty and gave him a kilo to take his weight to 54.5kg.

"Honolulu was a dominant winner of the Doncaster Cup, one of England's feature staying races, and his new weight of 54.5kg recognises he has continued to improve from his three-year-old form of 2007," Carpenter said.

As a three-year-old Honolulu finished second to last year's Melbourne Cup runner-up Purple Moon in the Ebor Handicap and third to Lucarno in the English St Leger.

Vintage Crop is the only horse to complete the Irish St Leger-Melbourne Cup double which he achieved in 1993.

Vinnie Roe went close when he finished second to Makybe Diva in the 2004 Cup.