Viewed wins the $5.5 Million 2008 Melbourne Cup giving Bart Cummings his 12th win and 250th Group 1 and jockey Blake Shinn his first Melbourne Cup.  Viewed managed to hold onto a nose margin over the fast finishing Bauer who has just narrowly missed repeating Media Puzzle’s 2002 triumph.

The race was run at a ridiclous tempo with the Adian Obrien trio true to their word of pushing the pace out in front by the time the field turned form home both Septimus and Alessandro Volta where clearly struggling and Honolulu had already drifted off the pace all together.  They all finished embarrassingly for what they set out to achieve with Honolulu last, Alessandro Volta 20th and Septimuis 18th.  For the ‘greatest’ stayer in the world, well pfft, never had it never will.

Not that I can really talk I guess my picks of Littorio, Boundless, Perfound Beauty and Littorio were never really in it. For the record Gallopin did not finish out the race.  For my main chance Littorio the race was not run to suit, as it was for the vast majority of the field.  This is the first time in some time that I have not had a place gettor for the Cup.  Never mind I am sure that I am not alone, the first 4 in NSW paid $500K and the trifecta was close to $80K.

But thankfully in our poll, of who would win the Cup, we had 11 readers select Viewed as the winner, so hopefully you backed that up with a huge collect!

So, where did your horse finish?

Sportsbet in the Northern Territory have taken on their biggest client with the customer placing a $1 million wager on Weekend Hussler to win today’s Underwood Stakes as being reported in today’s SMH.

It would appear as though punters are backing Weekend Hussler only and leaving a lot of the others alone, so expect to see some great odds about for Maldivian, Pompeii Ruler and Light Fantastic.  The main question however has to be the 1800m and can Weekend Hussler dominate like he has up to 1600.  Weekend Hussler is only proven up to 1600m, mind you his biggest win so far this preparation by 2.5 lengths was his last start over 1600 in the Maykbe Diva Stakes.  Light Fantastic seemed to be off his race that day and Maldivian was not there. I think this will be a bigger test, not just for the 1800 but a tougher group across the board to try and beat home.

From our Melbourne Cup perspective, while a lot of the action will take place at the pointy end of the field.  We need to be keeping an eye our for the following runners looking to continue their Melbourne Cup preparations:  Douro Valley, The Fuzz, Viewed, Zarita and Riva San.  None of these runners really have a chance today, altough I would not be surprised if Zarita popped up for a place, but key an eye out for these horses hitting the line.

Also, race 9 at Caulfield has a few Melbourne Cup potential runners in, Dolphin Jo, Zavite and Leica Falcon, come back for posts