Online Gambling - Racing

November 4, 2008

Local longshot capitvates the 107,000 strong crowd to win the 148th Melbourne Cup.

Starting the race at odds of 40-1, there wasn't many at Flemington that gave 'Viewed' a chance in the big race. With shaky recent form apart from a win in the Brisbane Cup over a much shorter 2400m, the Bart Cummings trained horse was deservedly long amongst such a stellar field.

But the fact many punters overlooked was that it was a Bart Cummings trained horse, and the Melbourne Cup is his playground. This victory took his total number of cup wins to 12, a record unlikely to ever be broken.

It was even the fourth cup win for owner Dato Tan Chin Nam, a Malaysian billionaire who has had previous wins with Bart Cummings trained horses.

The soon to be 81 years old Cummings had this to say about his owner after the race;

"He was having a drink in my bar in Adelaide years ago and we were playing two-up," he said. "And I thought I'd better stick with this bloke, because he's lucky."

"He's a benevolent owner, never complains, never asks me to explain anything, because he knows what we do is correct for the horses. And we only do what we think is right."

The race started controversially with three Aidan O'Brien trained Irish horses leading the field by six lengths and setting a blistering pace. All three, including pre-race favorite Septimus finished at the tail of field with two even pulling up lame.

Claims of possible racing as a team were vigourously defended by O'Brien when questioned by stewards after the race. If he was trying to use team tactics to favour his horses it didn't turn out too well for him, as the luck was not with Irish on this day.

Second place was also taken by an Australian horse - Bauer - and third was won by the French C'est La Guerre. The Trifecta paid a massive $22,000.

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Ed's Note: It's amazing that the only American Racebook that seemed to cover this race was Bodog. It was worth over $5.5 million, making it bigger than the 3 Triple Crown Races combined! Not to mention the international field and over 100,000 people at the track. Maybe one day the other US bookies will keep up with what's happening in the world around them....