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| Royal Ascot News 2012 |
running order/results 276i5e
Black Caviar - Aussie Sensation
08/06/12
Black Caviar is the extraordinary Australian mare who has won all 21 races that she has contested, setting a new modern-day international record for the top level of Flat racing.
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She arrived in England ahead of an attempt to record a 22nd consecutive career win in the Group 1 Diamond Jubilee Stakes at Ascot on June 23.
Peter Moody's charge will be staying at Jane Chapple-Hyam's Newmarket yard during her British sojourn, along with her fellow international raiders.
Here are 21 facts about her, one for each of her victories:
1. She is the greatest sprinter in the world and the second highest-rated horse on the planet behind the British-trained miler, Frankel. Both horses are set to race in QIPCO British Champions Series races during Royal Ascot, with Frankel targeting the Black Caviar cost 210,000 Australian dollars (about 132,000 at today’s rates) and she has now won over 3.6 million in prize money with a potentially very lucrative breeding career ahead of her once she retires. To illustrate this, her half-sister (by the sire Redoute’s Choice) just sold for 2.6 million Australian dollars (1.64m) at the Inglis Easter Yearling Sale – a record price for a yearling filly in Australia.
7. She has won her 21 races by a combined total of exactly 70 lengths – about 560 feet or 170 metres, or the equivalent of about 13 London buses!
8. She has started odds-on favourite in the betting on every occasion except her first ever race on 18 April 2009 at Flemington in Melbourne. The shortest price she started at was 1/33 meaning that if you had put 33 on her to win, your return would have been just 34! The local totalisator has taken numerous $100,000+ bets on her, the biggest being $200,000 at $1.04 when she won the Sportingbet Classic to record her 20th win – the punter’s profit was just $8,000. She is currently available with British bookmakers at 4/9 for the Diamond Jubilee Stakes and a huge number of Australians are expected to back her.
9. She is trained by Peter Moody at his stable at Caulfield racecourse in Victoria, Australia.
10. Luke Nolen has been her jockey in 18 of her 21 races, missing only her first two starts (when she was ridden by 16-year-old apprentice Jarrad Noske) and her first Group 1 victory in the Patinack Farm Classic in November 2010 (when Ben Melham was in the saddle as Nolen was suspended).
11. Black Caviar is owned by a group of life-long friends, Colin and Jannene Madden, Gary and Kerryn Wilkie and Neil Werrett, several of whom go right back to nursery school. They came up with the idea of buying a racehorse when enjoying their annual holiday together on a houseboat on the Murray River, not far from Adelaide. Neil Werrett knew Peter Moody, who, as it happens, had just come back from the sales with a big black yearling filly. They agreed to buy her, adding two others to their syndicate to spread the costs – Jannene Madden’s sister, Pam Hawkes, and another friend, David Taylor.
12. The wife of part-owner, David Taylor, was dead against her husband buying a share of the horse, so he had to do it behind her back – a brave move that paid off big-time and all is forgiven now!
13. Aussie Rules football star, Dale Thomas, who plays for top AFL team Collingwood, had a bet with David Taylor that Black Caviar wouldn’t win 20 consecutive races. Thomas has now fulfilled the of the bet by having an image of Black Caviar tattoed on his backside!
14. It was part-owner Pam Hawkes who came up with the Black Caviar’s name. The seafood lover explained: “Black Caviar’s grandmother was called Scandanavia. Helsinge, the name of her mother, is in Scandanavia and that’s where the salmon live. It made sense.” She added: “Besides my husband and children, Black Caviar is the best thing that has ever happened to me. It is a dream come true to have this beautiful horse.”
15. It was Gary and Kerryn Wilkie’s daughter who came up with the jockey’s very appropriate colours – salmon pink with black dots to represent the caviar! Gary said about Black Caviar: “You can’t imagine it. It’s a little surreal. You see the way she affects people, this animal we have equity in, and you just think, ‘How lucky am I’">
