Racing: One-time wonder from Wanganui

By MIKE DILLON

Seven out of 10 people tell you Phar Lap's 1930 Melbourne Cup was the best of all time.

Nah.

Sure, he was probably the best horse to win it, with the possible exception of Carbine. But Phar Lap was the best horse in the world at the time - his Agua Caliente Handicap win proved that - and the best horse in the world should win the Melbourne Cup.

Australia's greatest horse race is an event, not a horse race. It's about heritage, mystery, intrigue, punting and doing the unthinkable.

Give me a horse who overcame impossible odds. A horse most would have backed the milk cart dray to beat. Like Wotan.

When Wanganui brothers Bill, Bob and Pat Smith entered Wotan for the 1936 Melbourne Cup, Australian bookmakers fell about the place laughing. Punters shied away - to the extent that you could write your own betting ticket.

Have as much of the 100-1 as you like, said the bookies. So the Smith brothers did. Then they had some more.

To say the Smiths liked a bet is like saying the Anaheim Angels probably celebrated their World Series win. They unloaded big time.

But in those days there was so much betting on the cup you could have a serious bet without affecting your odds.

So the bookies rolled his price out to 200-1. The Smiths had more on, but no one could work out why. What were they basing it on?

If it was baseless optimism, nothing makes a bookmaker smile wider.

On paper Wotan had no place being there. He had no real credentials, although his form may have looked a tad better had he not got terribly seasick on a rough Tasman crossing to Sydney the previous autumn, racing only once, very poorly, before being sent home.

The Smiths had a fierce reputation for making Marcel Marceau look like a loudmouth. They never opened their mouths about their plans. Except once, to tell the bookies, after Wotan ran in the Cox Plate, that the horse was to be scratched from the Melbourne Cup.

So the 200-1 was bet at the calling of the card on cup eve. Yep, the Smiths had some more.

Wotan's chances were so despised the commentator in the cup parade is reported to have said: "It's Wotan, a New Zealand horse which isn't out of hack class, and what he's doing here I wouldn't know."

What Wotan did on cup day was remarkable.

Australian jockey Ossie Phillips told friends he was on Wotan simply for the losing riding fee, but that didn't happen.

Wotan tailed off last, then improved through the field without having to cover extra ground from the five-furlong marker.

Silver Standard looked like the winner in the home straight until Wotan unleashed a phenomenal finishing burst to grab a narrow win.

What was remarkable was that Wotan produced a one-time only performance. He had never looked that good before and did not capture a decent race again.

The Feilding Cup was one of only two races Wotan won in three seasons of racing after the Melbourne Cup.

Staying in character, the Smiths never revealed how much they won on the punt. With some help from bookmakers, the Melbourne media estimated it was £30,000, a fortune in Depression times.

The winning stake was £7200. If you won four or five times the winning stake of this year's Melbourne Cup, you're talking around $14 million. Now, that's what you call a bet.

Phar Lap would have left Wotan in his dust.

Okay, Phar Lap's Melbourne Cup is the best for talent.

But, for intrigue, give me Wotan.

And for silence give me the Smiths.

Unless you're a bookie.