Melbourne Cups King.

Well the Melbourne Cup has been won and lost for another year and life can return to normal again till next year. Before this year’s race, there was a big Brough-hah over the number of Foreign or overseas horses in it, with some wanting the number restricted to around five foreigners per race, to give the Aussie horses a better chance to win their own race. {Completely forgetting that before the other Foreign Horses were allowed to enter Australia, Kiwi Horses were often the winners, & with some even wanting to ban horses from there* too. (*New Zealand/Kiwi land!)}
Anyway, before this race, the Media was full of the prospects of these foreign horses and particularly three from an Irish Trainer’s stable. There was hardly any mention of the other horses, except that one writer, Ron Reed, in the Melbourne Herald Sun on the morning of the race, headlined his article, ”Ignore Bart at your peril”. He then went on to say such things as, “The cup is at the mercy of the invaders. Bookies and punters alike agree. Only history might have a different take on it.” And, “Respect the History.” He then went on to detail the history of the past 50 years since Bart Cummings as trainer, sent out his first runner in the race, way back in 1958.
Ron Reed then went on to play up the winning chances of Bart’s first runner, but also said this about Bart’s other runner in the Race, Viewed. “Viewed, the Brisbane cup winner, is not out of calculations either, and in fact the more you look at the field the more the Bart influence comes into play.” Well the race has run and History shows that Bart Cummings, 10 days short of his 81st Birthday, trained his twelfth Melbourne cup Winner with “Viewed” in 2008.
When asked for the secret of His success, Bart replied rather deadpan along the lines of, well you have the best staff and the best horses, feed them the best food and look after them right and the rest takes care of itself.
All this goes to show that to win you have to be genuinely in the race, and not give up mentally just because there are supposedly better horses from elsewhere in it too.
It means that you have to have confidence in yourself and your own horses, even if the rest of the world doesn’t.
It means that sometimes sheer class will win but at others, local knowledge and experience will also show out over the more showy prospects.
And it shows that taking care of the small details, like good staff, good horses a good food and Good conditions, help take care of the big things like winning the big races too.
So what can you learn from the "Bart Cummings” factor?
Things like, not letting your age stop you from trying one more time if you have the goods.
Like not resting on your laurels and saying eleven is enough. But going for number 12 anyway.
Like both giving and using the best.
Like using your experience, expertise and local knowledge.
So in closing, what do you need to adopt from Bart’s attitude and put into your own life experiences? Over to you for now.