News

Brisbane feasts on the Caviar

16th May 2011

*Sydney Morning Herald - Chris Roots - Monday, 16 May 2011

THE buzz surrounding Black Caviar has amazingly just got louder as the 20,000-plus Doomben crowd got their first taste of the great mare as she recorded a 13th-straight win on Saturday.

The unbeaten four-year-old recorded a sixth consecutive group 1 success in the BTC Cup, and is possibly the biggest sports story in the country.

''I have been working here for 30 years and can't remember anything like this,'' one Doomben official said as he walked into work just before 10 am with 1000 punters queueing to get into the track.

..''I have been here on days when that would have been the crowd. It's amazing what a good horse does, hey?''

Black Caviar is no longer an overpriced delicacy in Australia - she is racing to the man in the street. She already has the longest winning streak to start a career in Australian racing and more records are set to fall.

No Australian horse in the modern era has won seven group 1s in a season and Black Caviar sits on six alongside inaugural hall-of-famer Kingston Town and Weekend Hussler.

Retrospectively, another inaugural hall of fame inductee, Bernborough, won seven group 1s in a row in 1946 starting with the Futurity in Melbourne and finishing in the Doomben 10,000 - Black Caviar's next assignment.

More recently, Rock Of Gibraltar won seven group 1s in Europe in 2002 before being beaten in the Breeders' Cup in the US, so Black Caviar is in rare company.

The argument where she sits in racing's all-time pecking order can wait until her career finishes but she is starting to sit comfortably in the sporting fabric of the country, like greats Carbine, Phar Lap and Tulloch did in their time.

Her biggest achievement might be that she brings people to the races. ''Look, we had more than 20,000 people here and had hardly any trouble,'' Brisbane Racing Club chief executive Stephen Ferguson said.

''They were here to see her rather than party. You just had to look at the crowd after the race. They all had their phones and cameras in the air trying to take a photo.

''We just have to work out where we are going to fit them in in two weeks' time for the 10,000.''

Her owners, trainer Peter Moody and jockey Luke Nolen can look forward to that day and a real piece of history.

''It's just great that she keeps winning,'' managing owner Neil Werrett said. ''We want to showcase her to as many people as possible. This is something everyone is going to remember for a long time.''