Turf Heroes – Saintly
As part of our excitement about the Sydney and especially Melbourne Spring Racing Carnivals and all that they entail, Making The Nut is pleased to bring you a ten-part ‘Turf Heroes’ series, where Cliff Bingham will look back fondly upon the great memories these champions thoroughbreds embedded in his mind. Part five of the series recaps the career of 1996 Cox Plate and Melbourne Cup winner Saintly.
Previous “Turf Heroes” Instalments
Part 1: Super Impose
Part 2: Better Loosen Up
Part 3: Let’s Elope
Part 4: Octagonal
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The career
Much as with Super Impose, Better Loosen Up and Let’s Elope earlier in this series, Saintly wasn’t exactly a ‘child prodigy’ in the early parts of his career. His autumn two year-old campaign resulted in a win and a third placing from four starts, and when he resumed in the spring of 1995 as a three year-old his first assignment was not a ‘black type’ race, nor even a Saturday metropolitan event, but rather a Class-1 race at Newcastle. Little did we know at the time that the only two unplaced runs of his career had come and gone.
After winning the aforementioned race at Newcastle he returned to Sydney and recorded a win and a second in restricted three year-old grade before heading to Flemington for the Listed (nowadays Group 3) Carbine Club Stakes on VRC Derby day. Whilst future rivals Octagonal and Nothin’ Leica Dane slugged it out in the Derby itself, Saintly overcame racing three and four wide for much of the journey to win earlier in the day before running second in the Group 2 Sandown Guineas to end his preparation. He had certainly earmarked himself as a progressive type.
When resuming in February 1996 his star rose substantially. He won the Group 2 Expressway Stakes first-up and then ran second to Juggler in the Group 2 Apollo Stakes, both run against the older horses under WFA conditions. From there he returned to Flemington for a ‘hit and run’ mission on the Group 1 Australian Cup, defeating the older horses (as well as Nothin’ Leica Dane) by two and a half lengths. Both of the three year-olds then returned north to take Octagonal and Filante in the Rosehill Guineas and the AJC Derby.
What followed were two epic clashes between Saintly and Octagonal. On both occasions Saintly looked the winner inside the final 200 metres, yet on both occasions Octagonal dug a little deeper in the final strides and got up to win. In between the Rosehill Guineas and AJC Derby, both took on the older horses in the Group 1 Mercedes Classic, Saintly running third to Octagonal on that occasion. Nonetheless, it had been a truly classic crop of three year-olds, with future prospects for all looking bright.
However, the early part of Saintly’s 1996 spring four year-old campaign brought more in narrow defeat and frustration. He ran second Filante in both the Group 2 Warwick Stakes and Group 2 Chelmsford Stakes, won the Group 2 Hill Stakes but was subsequently beaten in both the Group 3 Craven Stakes and Group 1 Metropolitan Handicap, hitting the front in the home straight but contriving to lose on both occasions.
Whilst his career to that point had been excellent, he was running the risk of become an ‘almost’ horse, in the same vain that Greg Norman was so often an ‘almost’ US Masters winner. What was not clear to many at that time was that Cummings and Beadman had established two critical things about the runs: (1) Saintly didn't like the whip and (2) his saddle was shifting.
With saddle and riding style changes implemented, the unwanted ‘almost’ tag would soon be shed though as he once again headed to Melbourne, first for the Cox Plate and subsequently the Melbourne Cup. In a blanket finish at Moonee Valley, he just outlasted All Our Mob and his previous nemeses in Filante and Juggler to claim the Cox Plate, with his three year-old classics rival Octagonal a further three lengths back in fifth place.
His class was not in question anymore, but after his defeat in the Metropolitan, was he ‘tough’ enough to see out the two miles at Flemington in the Cup? The answer to that question was emphatic, as he relaxed beautifully in the run before gliding away from the field in the home straight.
Granted, you never really glide at the end of a two mile slog, but that’s what it felt like when watching it at the time. Indeed, he went to the line untouched in the Cup – Darren Beadman stating afterwards: "I just pushed him to the line without hitting him with the whip".
Any residual doubts about his class and toughness had been dispelled in two runs. Saintly had become the first horses since Rising Fast to win the Cox Plate – Melbourne Cup double, a feat Makybe Diva would replicate in 2005.
As if to emphasise the point, he resumed in February 1997 with a stunning win in the Group 1 Orr Stakes, completing an incredibly rare Cox Plate – Melbourne Cup – Orr Stakes treble. There aren’t many horses that can win all three races over the course of their career – Saintly did it in three consecutive starts.
Sadly, that was the last we saw of Saintly on the racetrack. A bowed tendon in his off leg just ten days after winning the Orr Stakes set him back for over a year. Like Better Loosen Up and Let’s Elope before him, injury had floored him at the height of his powers. Unlike those two gallopers though, there would be no return to the racetrack, as a second injury during track work at Eagle Farm in July 1998 ended any hopes of a comeback and by extension, his racing days. It was a sad end to an all too brief career.
The memories
Let’s start with a quote from trainer Bart Cummings, who once said of Saintly "He's the longest strider I've ever had. I reckon he would have gone 18 feet". Unsurprising then that he seemed to glide across the turf rather than crash into it. Have you ever watched Usain Bolt run? The man never looks like he gets past third gear, yet he’s obviously going at his maximum speed. Saintly ran in a similar fashion.
Had he been a cricketer of that era, he would have unquestionably been Mark Waugh – consistently making full tilt assaults look almost laconic purely as a function of his style. Even when he was working hard in a race, it never looked that way.
He also inadvertently gave me the split second of greatest excitement puncturing into disappointment of my then still immature gambling life.
By now a 16 year-old, I had convinced the folks to up my Melbourne Cup wagers to a fiver each way on my pick and a one dollar box trifecta. Having successfully put my fiver each way on Doriemus in 1995 (a very rare moment of Cup success), I went his way again, throwing Saintly and 40-1 shot Count Chivas in for the trifecta.
As Saintly drew away and Count Chivas boxed on in second place, I spotted blue and pink silks on the left of TV screen making a move and for a split second thought a monster payout was coming…. only to see that it was the wrong set of blue and pink silks, with Skybeau running third and Doriemus rattling home all too late for sixth. Dammit all.
Cummings also said of Saintly after he bowed a tendon in 1997 that he was still maturing and growing into his body as a three-year old, and that "this year would have been his best". Consider that statement for a moment and come with me into my old favourite, the ‘what if’ game.
Saintly won the Orr Stakes easily; his logical preparation path would be into the St George Stakes, a defence of his Australian Cup title and then onto Sydney for the Mercedes and the Queen Elizabeth Stakes. Octagonal won the Australian Cup and Mercedes Classic before running second in the Queen Elizabeth – how would he have gone against his old sparring partner Saintly in that 1997 autumn? It’s a tantalising thought, but I have one better.
Flash forward to the 1997 spring – Octagonal skips the breeding barn for one last campaign; he and Saintly clash in the Cox Plate and then both head to Flemington for the Melbourne Cup, taking on the Caulfield Cup quinella of Might and Power and Doriemus. Granted, it’s a four-way clash that was never terribly close to fruition, but had it occurred, I’d have insisted that someone write a book about that race and that race alone. Like you wouldn’t remember that version of the 1997 Melbourne Cup as if it was yesterday? Please.
As it was, I’ll always remember Saintly as the Mark Waugh of the turf, where it was important to not let his graceful and laconic style overshadow a determined and extremely successful galloper.
The stats
Overall record: 23 starts, 10 wins (4 x Group 1s, 2 x Group 2s), eight seconds, three thirds, $3,721,765 prize money
2YO autumn/ winter (1995): Four starts, one win, one third
3YO spring/ summer (1995-96): Five starts, three wins, two seconds
3YO autumn/ winter (1996): Six starts, two wins (1 x G1, 1 x G2), three seconds, one third
4YO spring/ summer (1996-97): Seven starts, three wins (2 x G1, 1 x G2), three seconds, one third
4YO autumn/ winter (1997): One start, one win (1 x G1)
