THE prospect of another Melbourne Cup being won by an Australian-bred horse received a boost with the impressive win of the Grahame Begg-trained Zakouma to win the Andrew Ramsden Stakes at Flemington.
The win carried a golden ticket into the Melbourne Cup and the style of Zakouma’s win was impressive enough to suggest he won’t be out of place.
Against the recent trends, Australian-bred and trained stayers have won the past two Melbourne Cups with the victories of Knight’s Choice and Half Yours.
Zakouma will carry only 51 kilograms in the Melbourne Cup, which is 7.5 kilos less than he carried to win the Andrew Ramsden Stakes over 2800m.
The other impressive aspect was that he had not been in a race further than 2000m.
Begg said after the win that Zakouma is “a true staying horse.”
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“Full credit to the horse as he beat the weight scale today with his rating,” Begg said, referring to the weight of 58.5 kilos as he was a 78 rated galloper going into the race.
“Trevor Delroy (breeder and owner) has been extremely patient all the way through and allowed us to do what we wanted to do with him, so hopefully we’ll be here on the first Tuesday of November.
Zakouma was ridden by Jordan Child,s who said the galloper just got stronger and stronger in the closing stages, so the 3200m won’t be a problem for him.
Childs though is likely to be watching Zakouma as he can only ride around 55 kilograms and he quipped his dieting would have to start now to ride the horse.
Unibet firmed Zakouma into $21 for the Melbourne Cup.
