If you find trawling through a Melbourne Cup form guide more daunting than public speaking, don’t fret, we’ve got a simple way to help you choose which horse to back in the main event this afternoon — and it’ll be over in 60 seconds.
It’s even quicker this year because the field is down to 23 after CLEVELAND was a late scratching on Monday evening.
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Next up, we can discount the outsiders. Only three horses in the past 30 years — Twilight Payment ($27 in 2020), Prince Of Penzance ($101 in 2015) and Viewed ($41 in 2008) — have won the race at odds higher than $20.
So that means you should feel reasonably safe ruling out ALENQUER ($41), RIGHT YOU ARE ($34), VOW AND DECLARE ($26), ASHRUN ($34), DAQIANSWEET JUNIOR ($71), OKITA SOUSHI ($81), SHERAZ ($101), MAGICAL LAGOON ($101), MILITARY MISSION ($23), SERPENTINE ($41), VIRTUOUS CIRCLE ($126), MORE FELONS ($26), INTERPRETATION ($81), KALAPOUR ($41) and TRUE MARVEL ($101).
See there you go, that’s more than two-thirds of the field gone already from your calculations just like that, leaving us with eight runners.
Next up we can eliminate Japanese entrant BREAKUP ($19) as it’s jumping from Barrier 18, where only one winner has started in the last 50 years.
You’ll have to forgive us for the next cuts, because we’re about to get a little sexist — and ageist.
Just sixteen times — roughly one in 10 Melbourne Cups — has the race been won by a female horse.
So apologies to LASTOTCHKA ($18), you’re next on the chopping block.
We’re getting to the nitty gritty here with just six horses remaining.
Now out of the 162 winners in the long history of the great race, only a tiny 14 have been seven years or older.
So that eliminates defending champion GOLD TRIP ($7.50) and WITHOUT A FIGHT ($7).
If we’re looking for some more recent history, since 2006, five favourites have been listed under $5 and exactly none of them have won the race, so that spells the end of VAUBAN ($4.60).
To help you add some extra lustre to your Cup knowledge, horses that have never previously won over 3200m typically struggle in the Melbourne Cup.
That rules out SOULCOMBE ($10) and FUTURE HISTORY ($19), who have never triumphed over that distance.
So, drumroll please, that leaves us with only one horse, French gelding ABSURDE ($10).
