Words for a Champion
“It’s only a horse, I was quickly informed
It was hardly a reason to cry
Only a horse with a mane and four legs,
As the tear trickled out of my eye
And I knew that I’d never let go of that tear
As it ran off the end of my nose
For it carved out a place in the depth of my heart
For the horse they call Super Impose”
– More Than a Horse, Rupert McCall
Super Impose was laid to rest last Friday, the champion having breathed his last. Old age achieved what the racing couldn’t and saw the champ beat. Battling the infirmities of old age, Super Impose was put down at the grand old age of twenty-two. He lays in the bounds of the Glenlogan Stud and is buried in the dirt and turf of the country that holds him in its collective heart. The final song has played and sadly, that is that.
The one thing that stands tall and firm from the infantile racing days of yore is the mighty Super Impose. He was the first horse I loved and that love has held true nearly twenty years on. It was certainly with a heavy heart that I received the news of Super’s passing. The news hit like a hammer.
The memories of youth are often short snippets that recall a feeling more than context. And so it is when delving for early racing thoughts. My first Melbourne Cup winner, Empire Rose. Pete Boss winning four figures on Surfers Paradise in the Cox Plate and the subsequent night of free bowling and Pizza Hut. Sweep stakes. Picnics at the Friday night trots. And, of course, Super Impose.
As a kid, horse racing isn’t the clockwork regularity it is to the punting populace that follow the game in older years. It is an event, like Christmas. Something you only see once or twice a year. The fervor of Melbourne Cup day, even to a kid, is felt throughout. There is excitement and joy everywhere on Cup morn. It was on that first Tuesday in November, 1989 I think, that I met Super Impose.
Not literally of course. But on reflection, it still meant a hell of a lot.
Super Impose, chestnut and burly, didn’t win that day. He ran second. The stablemate, Tawrific, sailed past him down the stretch. But he ran like a prince, courageous and tough and without pomp. He held his head high and was proud of his achievements. Had he known of his stout heritage, he would have been doubly proud for Super seemed to take pride in doing things the hard way.
It wasn’t the ticket for $10-odd that won me over. It wasn’t the thrill of the day. It was the grit and posture and character that won me over to the ever growing club of fans who got their kicks watching the mighty Super race. Even as a fresh faced boy with nothing in the way of horse knowledge or punting smarts, I could tell that Super Impose was special.
It was the hard way that saw Super Impose reach his greatest heights. And those heights came in 1990 and 1991 when against the odds and the handicapper and even luck, Super Impose achieved the greatest miling achievement in the history of the Australian turf. Super Impose won back-to-back Doncaster Handicaps and Epsom Handicaps, a feat that has never been nearly achieved and is unlikely to ever be topped.
To understand what a monumental achievement this double double was, one has to understand the stature of these two races in Australian racing, as well as the significance of the obstacles he overcame to win the four big miles on the trot. The Doncaster and Epsom Handicaps are the two biggest mile races in Australia and within the ten most important races in the nation. They are contested on the headquarters of Australian racing over a course renowned for its toughness. They are races won by champions.
Winning these four races on the trot is an awe inspiring feat in itself. On paper, it is an achievement for the ages. But when one considers how Super won these features, the achievement is magnified many fold. Super Impose, like a depressed sado-masochist, won them the hardest way possible. He carried big weights and always came from well back. In these four big miles, Super Impose saluted under the huge weights of 57, 58.5, 59.5 and 61kg, always coming from behind. There is nothing more difficult in racing than coming from the tail of the field under a big weight, gravity and luck usually playing against you. His finest win was the 1991 Epsom Handicap where, under the direction of Darren Beadman and under the burden of 61 kilograms, Super Impose weaved a passage from last to first to record one of the most memorable and remarkable big race wins in the history of the race game. Not one person who saw that race in some state of sobriety has ever forgotten that win.
There was big hype around a possible three-peat but Super just couldn’t make it. He was eight years old and it appeared as if his best racing days were behind him. He just couldn’t muster the old turn of foot that made him a star of the track. But the old champion wasn’t done yet. The Doncaster and the Epsom eluded him but Australia’s number one race, the W.S Cox Plate, could not. In what was a race full of performing group one stars, Super Impose swept home down the small Valley straight and raced into history. He was the oldest ever Cox Plate winner until Fields of Omagh won in 2006 and he downed a field that included some all time greats.
He raced once more- a downtrack effort in the bog of Subzero’s Melbourne Cup- and was retired to a well earned life of rest and relaxation. Super Impose left the game having won eight group one races and more prizemoney than any horse to have raced in this country. The big hearted chestnut had gone from a humble beginning- modest breeding and one win from his first fifteen starts- to racing immortality and a place in the heart of the Australian racegoer.
One can’t help but be proud of the achievements of Super Impose. There were better horses, more princely types and bigger winners, but none carried themselves and the rest of us like old Super. He wasn’t winning for himself or The Game or the thrill. He won for us and for pride and for those who believed.
There isn’t a racing fan alive who didn’t love Super Impose. From the bluebloods to Joe Nickel, Super touched us all, lifting our spirits with his courage and our hearts with his will. He was a champion of the people and a tribute to the game. As Rupert McCall so eloquently said, “he was only a horse, but more like a mate, the champion Super Impose”. No lesser prose would do the mighty Super justice.