Moonee Valley’s A$6m Group One WS Cox Plate (2040m) is known as the weight-for-age championship of Australasia and has been won by many of Australia and New Zealand’s greatest thoroughbreds.
From Phar Lap (NZ) (Night Raid) to So You Think (NZ) (High Chaparral) and many others in between, graduates of New Zealand’s National Yearling Sale make up a key part of that rich history.
NZB will celebrate the 100th anniversary of the National Yearling Sales at Karaka in January. That century of sales has produced 20 Cox Plate champions.
The Cox Plate has been run since 1922 and has had a total of 36 New Zealand-bred winners, starting with the great Nightmarch (NZ) (Night Raid) in 1929.
1930 & 1931: PHAR LAP
The first New Zealand National Yearling Sale graduate to win the Cox Plate is one of the greatest of them all. Phar Lap (NZ) was born near Timaru in New Zealand’s South Island and was offered at Trentham in 1928, where he was bought for 160 guineas.
The legendary chestnut had 51 starts for 37 wins and five placings. He won 32 of his last 35 races.
Phar Lap won 13 times in his three-year-old season, including the Australian Derby (2400m), VRC Derby (2500m), Rosehill Guineas (1800m), VRC St Leger (2800m), Chipping Norton Stakes (2000m) and AJC St Leger (2800m). He also ran third in the Melbourne Cup (3200m).
He went on to win 14 of his 16 starts as a four-year-old in 1930-31 including his first Cox Plate as well as the Melbourne Cup, Melbourne Stakes (2000m), St George Stakes (1800m) and Futurity Stakes (1400m). His Melbourne Cup triumph came under a weight of 9 stone, 12 ounces – the equivalent of 62.5kg.
Phar Lap added a second Cox Plate as a five-year-old, along with the Underwood Stakes (1600m), Memsie Stakes (1800m), Craven Plate (2000m) and Melbourne Stakes (2000m), and he then ventured to Mexico and won the US$100,000 Agua Caliente Handicap (2000m) in what would be the final start of his extraordinary career.
Phar Lap was among the inaugural inductees into both the New Zealand Racing Hall of Fame and the Australian Racing Hall of Fame. Respected American publication the Blood-Horse magazine voted him the 22nd greatest racehorse of the 20th century.
