The Sir Rupert Clarke has been a race of many names since its inauguration in 1951 as the Invitation Stakes, which it remained until 1974 and champion sires Exceed And Excel, Encosta de Lago and Testa Rossa (twice) all scorched around Caulfield to take the prize.
It has always run under handicap conditions at the 1400m distance and became a G1 race in 1979, after Manikato won in 1978.
It's been known as the Marlboro Cup, Show Day Cup, Vic Health Cup, the Eat Well Live Well Cup, the Dubai Racing Club Cup - but following the passing of VATC Chairman Sir Rupert Clarke in 2005, it was decided the historic sprint should honour his name.
A name befitting a contest that has been won by some Australian turf greats.
Matrice, Anonyme (twice), Tauto (twice), Cap dAntibes, Raffindale, St Jude, Mannerism, Our Maizcay, Mr Murphy, Regal Roller, were all household names in their day.
More recently, topliners like Behemoth and Santa Ana Lane have saluted.
Mares have been on a hot streak with Kimochi beating Another Wil last year and Magic Time winning in 2023.
This year the exciting Angel Capital (Harry Angel) reigns as favourite over a big field of 17 runners and he did win on this day last year taking out the G3 Caulfield Guineas Prelude over the same course and distance.
A little rain is forecast and a cold day on Saturday, but the heat will be on for horses and jockeys!
Top Pick: SEPALS
He's drawn a horror gate, and he attempts G1 level for the first time, but four year old Sepals does give the impression he might be a bit special.
His sire Calyx had elite speed. Coolmore's exciting son of Kingman was sadly lost as a result of injury earlier this year.
The winner of Royal Ascot's time honoured Coventry Stakes at two, Calyx raced only four times and was in fact the very first winner for champion sire Kingman.
Calyx wasn't a G1 winner himself, but at the time of his passing he already had G1 placed progeny and multiple G2 winners among his seven stakes winners. Breeders had recognised his worth, and Calyx had covered more mares than any other sire in Europe in the 2024 season.
It's just a matter of time before his first G1 winner salutes.
Will it be Sepals? Well I reckon he's a huge chance.
Sepals was a modest $80,000 Inglis Classic purchase from the Vinery Stud draft for his trainer Cliff Brown, who races him with a loyal group of owners.
There are few better judges of a youngster than Cliff, who trained G1 winners in Australia before enjoying a long period of success in Singapore. Now based at Mornington, Brown might not preside over a big “name” stable but he is a horseman right up there with the best.
He trained Sepal's dam What's New (by the excellent sire and broodmare sire Casino Prince), and she was a bit of a star - winning two legs of the Singaporean Triple Crown and unlucky not to win the Derby.
What's New was awarded Singapore's Champion 4YO honours, and Sepals is her first foal.
So she's come right out of the gates with an absolute ripper!
What's New was the best of five winners produced by her dam Pussycat Dream (Oasis Dream) and a half sister to Tale Of The Cat daughter The Cats Whiskers who produced high class Kiwi filly Tavy (Tavistock)
Sepals descends from G1 sprinting mare Good Faith by Mr Prospector's ever reliable Straight Strike.
She produced 8 winners among them G1 placed Tully Dane, Listed winner Mygoodgrace and Private - who became dam of G2 Sweet Embrace winner Believe Yourself (Sebring).
The dam of Good Faith was Head Of The River by Shirley Heights, a close relative of the great Epsom Oaks winner Bireme.
The taproot mare of this prolific family (11-d) is Felsetta by Felstead - and right from the start it was a line that produced Classic types who trained on, rather than any flash of juvenile glory.
Oaks winning mares were the calling card of this tribe.
One of Felsetta's granddaughters Ark Royal became dam of NZ's legendary broodmare sire Hermes.
Current stars from Sepal's family are top class G1 winning NZ colt Savaglee (Savabeel - second in the Australian Guineas to Feroce) and his magnificent dual G1 winning full sister Orchestral.
Sepals raised eyebrows when he cruised to a three length victory in the G3 CS Hayes Stakes 1400m at Flemington - his third win, fourth race start and first prep. Behind him were high quality gallopers including Feroce (Super Seth) who won the G1 Australian Guineas at his next start, and is a rival again in this race.
Only a serious talent makes that progression with such ease. It's notable too that Sepals isn't a 1200m speedball that might be tested at the end of 1400m, or a mile/middle distance type resuming - it looks like a strongly run 1400m is his absolute sweet spot and that's too his advantage here.
The other is his breeding, because it’s a pedigree to bring joy to pedigree nerds!
Over his deeply Classic damline speed has been imprinted, and over that is created an outstanding duplication - Sepals is bred on a 3x 43 cross of close brothers in blood.
Kingman is a son of Green Desert's breedshaping son Invincible Spirit out of a daughter of Blue Hen Hope (by Arc winner Dancing Brave) - and his second damsire Oasis Dream is by Green Desert out of Hope herself.
We know the Green Desert sireline reacts favourably to close linebreeding (e.g. our own G1 winner and sire Hellbent) but it's the duplication of Hope that is the major X factor here in combination with another great matron, Lalun and her sire Never Bend.
Sepals is bred:
Danzig 5m x 5m,5m
Green Desert 4m x4m
Mr Prospector 5m x 5f sex balanced (and sex balanced 6m x 6f, 6m)
Blue Hen Hope 4f x 4m sex balanced
Lalun is present everywhere - through Mill Reef (sex balanced), Shirley Heights and Riverman.
Never Bend's daughters Courtly Dee and Bend Not are grand dam and dam of Green Desert and Straight Strike respectively - and additionally both sires carry lines of Royal Charger (three quarter brother to Never Bend's sire Nasrullah).
Hope by Dancing Brave is from the wider 19 family to which also belongs Lalun, and was out of a Mill Reef mare!
Sepals is also Intensely linebred (sex balanced) to Nijinsky, and his three quarter brother The Minstrel.
With 52kg, second up fitness and the supreme coolness and skill of Willo on board I'm trusting that any bad voodoo around barrier 16 can be overcome.
Will a new sprinting star be revealed?
Next best: ARKANSAW KID
Where Sepals is the promising speed gun on the rise, Arkansaw Kid is the experienced campaigner.
There's always a little bit of a doubt when a horse backs up for the first time, but the Hayes stable have trained the five year old son of Harry Angel throughout his career - and if they think this is the way to bring out a peak performance I'm backing their judgement!
Arkansaw Kid is a tough customer too, one of those horses that is rarely far away and always dangerous.
He is yet to win a G1 but he’s been close. This is his big chance, well weighted in a handicap at a course he loves.
His grandsire Dark Angel, famously sires horses that get better with a bit of age and I reckon Harry Angel will be exactly the same.
Arkansaw Kid has placed at his three 1400m starts, and also placed in the Listed Sandown Guineas 1600m at three.
With the ultimate gear change employed along the way, maturity should see Arkansaw Kid just about reaching his peak now. There's still plenty of time for the $1.8m earner to add a well deserved G1 win to his CV!
Arkansaw Kid was bred by Phillippa Duncan Bloodstock and is by far the best of six from seven to race out of the Exceed And Excel mare Florabella, a three-quarter sister to G1 CF Orr Stakes winner Shinzig (Danehill)
Florabella is a daughter of Coolmore Classic heroine Shindig (Straight Strke), the best of four stakeswinners from her dam Saving (Pevero)
This family goes back to the famous Oaks winner Morel, taproot mare of family 1-b
The breed shaping broodmare sires Troy and Princequillo descend from her.
Arkansaw Kid is bred
Mr Prospector 5m x 4m
Northern Dancer x 5m,5m
The source of much of Harry Angel's speed is an interesting sex balanced lines to Migoli, whose son Gallant Man sired his ancestress Avie and who is also the third dam of his damsire Cadeaux Genereux.
The Aga Khan bred Migoli was a champion winning everything from the Dewhurst to the Eclipse to the Arc. His full sister Star Of Iran became third dam of the great broodmare sire Nassipour.
Their dam Mah Mahal produced champion Mahmoud, and was a half sister to the dam of Nasrullah. This is a great nick for Exceed And Excel with his duplications of Almahmoud, enhanced by Machiavellian in Harry.
Related family lines in Straight Strike, Pevero and Faux Tirage are all carried tail female by Arkansaw Kid's dam.
He's fourth up here, and he does like a bit of cut in the ground which he will get.
He's placed two from three fourth up starts, never been unplaced at 1400m in three starts, and never been unplaced in seven starts at the track!
Arkansaw Kid draws perfectly in one and Blake Shinn sticks.
Will the G1 stars align for Arkansaw Kid at last?
Roughie: FEROCE
Big boy Feroce didn't run out the 2000m strongly in the G1 Australian Cup - a bridge too far at three, but perhaps not so this time around.
The son of Dundeel’s exciting son Super Seth is out of an O'Reilly mare and his pedigree is yet another variation on the famed Zabeel / Eight Carat cross.
Feroce became the first G1 winner for his sire when he took the Australian Guineas in the Autumn, and had been unlucky not to win the Caulfield version in the Spring - had he won both he would have been the first horse since the champion Naturalism to achieve the feat!
Feroce is the sixth foal out of the unraced O'Reilly mare Corinthia, a half sister to G1 Rosehill Guineas winner De Beers Her grand dam is champion filly Tristalove, by Sir Tristram out of Diamond Lover.
Feroce is bred:
Northern Dancer 5m x 5m,5m
Sir Tristram 5m x 4f sex balanced
Danehill 4m x 3f sex balanced
Is 1400m too short for Feroce, who has won two of his second up starts but placed once in three starts at the trip? Well I'm just hoping to see Billy Egan get him is a nice forward possie and finish strongly off what should be a fast run race!
He's got the ability.
Blowout: IS IT ME
Outclassed in the Memsie at WFA but this is a more realistic assignment for the six year old son of Iffraaj.
He's extremely genuine and the progeny of his sire do improve with age.
Is It Me was a $40,000 cheapie at the 2021 Inglis Premier from the Lime Country Thoroughbreds draft for Bowman Racing, and he has been a great performer for his Warrnambool based trainer and a big group of owners.
He has earned $557,050 in his 23 starts, which have yielded 7 wins and a big G3 victory in the 1400m Shaftesbury Avenue Hcp in March where he bolted in by more than three lengths with 54.5kg, the same.
Is It Me's French bred,stakes winning dam Gosh was by Nureyev's Arc winning son Peintre Celebre, an elite broodmare sire. She was imported into Australia and placed in the ATC Winter Cup before going to stud.
It's a real stamina family with her dam Ragazza Mio (Generous) also stakes placed in the 2400-500 distance range - but a half sister to Aussie G1 winner He's Your Man (Cape Cross) who won the G1 Epsom Hcp as well as the Kingston Town Stakes - he also placed in the G1 Mackinnon at WFA.
They were out of Via Saleria by Arazi and the family is a prolific producer of black type perfomers in Europe. It is the damline of Derby winner and elite broodmare sire Quest For Fame.
Is It Me is bred:
Raise A Native 5m x 5m
Northern Dancer 5m,4m x 5m
Nureyev 3f x 3m sex balanced
The last is a big speed producing pattern while Iffraaj, like his close relative Cape Cross, contributes his own unique brand of acceleration to the mix.
Is It Me drops to the featherweight of 52kg and his third up record is a vast improvement on his second up results which makes the Memsie defeat look perhaps a little more unflattering than it really was.
The horse loves Caulfield, and the 1400m trip - he should get a lovely run for Patrick Maloney from barrier 8.
I Am Me is not and will never be a glamour turf star, but he's by a great sire from a very, very classy Euro damline and you just don't rule those horses out - in quality handicaps in particular
He's a great each way hope!
