墨爾本杯再加碼去到 5,500,000 澳元
成為世界第二最高獎金的草地賽事
The 2008 Melbourne Cup will be worth a record $5.5 million after the Victoria Racing Club announced the first prizemoney increase in three years for Australia's most famous race.
The VRC approved a rise of 10 per cent, or $500,000, on last year's Cup making it the second richest turf race in the world behind France's $A6.275 million weight-for-age Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe.
"It is no secret we regard the Melbourne Cup as the staying championship of the world and we are absolutely determined that it stays on the world stage," said VRC chief executive Dale Monteith.
However, Monteith said a $10 million Melbourne Cup was still "a fair way off" and had not been discussed at board level even though the 150th Melbourne Cup will be run in 2010.
The last prizemoney increase for the Melbourne Cup was in 2005 when it rose from $4.5 million to $5 million to coincide with the first year of Emirates Airline's sponsorship of the race.
The winner's cheque for the Melbourne Cup will now be worth $3.3 million while prizemoney for horses finishing second to 10th has also risen, based on a percentage formula commensurate with the horse's placing.
With the increases in the world price of gold over the last 18 months, the trophies for the Melbourne Cup will be more valuable than ever this spring.
They have been substantially increased to a total of $150,000, including the handcrafted owner's trophy which is 1650 grams of 18-carat gold and has been revalued from $80,000 to $125,000.
Monteith said the latest rise in Cup prizemoney was warranted in light of increased prizemoney for other races at Flemington over the past three years.
"One of the challenges is to spread prizemoney across the board and since 2005 our minimum prizemoney for ordinary Saturday races has gone up 25 per cent and our Group and Listed races have gone up on average 9.4 per cent," Monteith said.
The nation's premier two-year-old race, the Golden Slipper, is the second richest race in Australia with a purse of $3.5 million plus trophies ahead of the Cox Plate at $3.14 million.
Monteith has returned from Japan where he attended Sunday's Kyoto meeting featuring the Group One Tenno Sho (3200m) which earlier this year was announced as a ballot exempt race for the Melbourne Cup.
Admire Jupiter won the Tenno Sho and Monteith confirmed that the stayer's connections were targeting the Melbourne Cup following the success of Japan's Delta Blues who claimed Australia's greatest race in 2006 when he beat stablemate Pop Rock.
Last year the Japanese horses did not run at the Melbourne spring carnival because of the equine influenza (EI) outbreak but it's expected that Australia will be officially declared EI free next month, paving the way for the Japanese raiders to return this spring.
Monteith said he was also hopeful that at least one horse from America would be aimed at the Melbourne Cup as well as the usual European contingent.
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