BACK FROM THE BRINK

Herald Sun Exclusive by Glenn McFarlane, Pictures by Jay Town

Danny O'Brien vowed — and almost declared — he would be back in the Group 1 window again.

He never lost faith, even through the cobalt tornado that shook the foundations of his Flemington stable, peeled millions off his business, and cost him the chance to buy yearlings with new clients who might well have turned into champions.

He never lost belief in his own training ability, nor the systems his team had in place.

He maintained he would be vindicated that he had no knowledge of how four of his horses tested positive to excessive cobalt levels in late 2014, which the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal ultimately found in his favour years later.

Importantly, he never lost the support of his closest owners or loyal staff who stuck by him through the three-year ordeal.

“It’s not in my personality (to give up),” O’Brien told the Herald Sun, from his Flemington stables, near the famous straight six.

“I knew we had done nothing wrong.

“Damian Shiels, our barrister through the whole thing, was incredible. He told us it was going to be a marathon, not a sprint, and he was right.”

On Saturday, a striking chestnut with a familiar pedigree and an appropriate name — Vow And Declare — will provide O’Brien with the chance to not only win his second Caulfield Cup, but his first Group 1 PC (post cobalt).

If the four-year-old gelding can win the $5 million race, it would be O’Brien’s first Group 1 success since his Cox Plate winner Shamus Award backed his form up to win the 2014 Australian Guineas.

Vow And Declare almost broke O’Brien’s Group 1 drought in June when he ran second to Mr Quickie in the Queensland Derby, but after a slashing first-up run in the Turnbull Stakes earlier this month, the horse is now considered a serious Caulfield and Melbourne Cup contender.

Making it even more satisfying is the fact Vow And Declare is a local horse whose own pedigree reads like a road map of O’Brien’s training past.

While plane-loads of internationals have delivered horses from all corners of the globe, Vow And Declare was bred in Australia — albeit from a shuttle stallion, Declaration Of War, who served only two seasons here before the lack of local interest brought an end to his spring southern hemisphere sojourns down under.

“It is very rare now to have a horse that was conceived, born and raised in Australia who ends up being a chance in the (Melbourne) Cup,” O’Brien said.

“Our gene pool isn’t all that different (to the internationals), but Declaration Of War is a perfect example. He could have been a great influence down here, but unfortunately we only got him for two seasons, not 10.”

O’Brien couldn’t be happier with his stable’s recent hot streak, which sees him with a serious Cups hope, and Oaks and Derby chances in Miami Bound and Serious Liaison, among other good spring hopes.

“We’ve been progressively building over the last 18 months,” O'Brien said.

“We’ve got a great team that know our systems well and our systems have never worked better.

“We think we’ve really nailed it now.”

He couldn’t be happier with how his banner horse Vow And Declare came into his stables as a raw yearling having been passed in for $45,000 off a $60,000 reserve at the 2017 Inglis Classic Sales.

“You never really know where they are going to come from,” he said.

“Obviously, you can go and spend a million dollars overseas and find one that has already got some sort of record,” he said.

“But we got this guy … broke him in and took him slowly through last spring.”

Vow And Declare’s bloodlines brought the then unnamed yearling to O’Brien’s magnificent 13th Beach facility at Barwon Heads, which he runs in conjunction with his main stable operation at Flemington.

He was a half brother to O’Brien’s smart stayer Lycurgus, whose owners approached Vow And Declare’s breeders to broker a deal.

“Geoff Corrigan (one of the owners of Lycurgus) ended up buying half of him and Paul Lanskey and his family, who bred and still own the mother (Geblitzt), retained some of the horse, and the others in Lycurgus (Stuart Knipe and Stuart Livingstone) came in as well,” he said.

O’Brien had bought Lycurgus as a yearling for $70,000 at the 2015 Easter Yearling Sales, partly because he was by Star Witness.

Six years earlier he had bought Star Witness as a yearling for $150,000 at the Magic Millions and turned him into a champion, winning a Blue Diamond and Coolmore Stud Stakes.

He had been attracted to the yearling who became Star Witness because he had trained the horse’s mother, the talented Leone Chiara.

It all fits rather neatly in hindsight.

“It’s amazing to think that because of a horse we won the Blue Diamond and a Coolmore with, I’ve now got a Caulfield and Melbourne Cup chance,” he said.

O’Brien’s confidence in Vow And Declare came when he won a 2381m maiden at Warrnambool leading into last spring, giving rise to a belief he might be a Victoria Derby chance.

Then came the sliding doors moment.

Vow And Declare was second emergency for last year's Derby, and didn't make the final field.

Initially, O’Brien was disappointed. Now he concedes, missing that race might have been the makings of him.

“We were flat at not getting a run, but it turned out to be one of those little sliding doors moments in life,” he said.

“There is no doubt it was the best thing that could have happened to him.

“It was a really brutal Derby last year.” 

O’Brien switched tack to an 1800m Stakes race on Oaks Day when Vow And Declare ran down Junipal with a withering finish.

“We knew he could stay, but we didn’t know he would be classy enough to win over that distance in better races.

“All of a sudden we got pretty excited about what he might be able to do in the spring as a four-year-old.”

Vow And Declare was “a bit stiff” when second to Mr Quickie in the Queensland Derby, then put pay to seasoned stayer Big Duke to win the Group 3 Tatts Cup.

O’Brien “poked around” with Vow And Declare, keeping him in light work, before his slashing fourth in this month’s Turnbull Stakes, beating Cox Plate contender Mystic Journey and stamped himself as one of the spring’s exiting locals.

“He couldn’t have gone any better that day,” O'Brien said.

“He wasn’t suitable to muddling tempo, he levelled out with Mystic Journey and went to the line every bit as well as her.”

Craig Williams will ride Vow And Declare on Saturday, and a track gallop on Tuesday morning has given O’Brien confidence his horse can be competitive on Saturday, perhaps even more so in the Melbourne Cup.

“It’s exciting, but you can have a very good horse and it can still get rolled in a Melbourne Cup, particularly now,” he said.

“Our horse is a very good horse, and if I was sitting here talking to you in 1990, not 2019, I would say Vow And Declare is going to be very hard to beat in the Melbourne Cup.

“But I don’t know what’s come (from overseas).”

Having already won two legs of the Victorian Spring Carnival “Big Three” — the 2007 Caulfield Cup with Master O’Reilly and the 2013 Cox Plate with Shamus Award — he knows what it would mean to claim the extra leg of that very special trifecta — one that a precious few trainers can boast.

It’s the race that has stirred his imagination since he was a kid, watching the 1979 Melbourne Cup — as a nine-year-old — on the television from his school class room.

“It would mean so much, and it would mean so much to your family and friends, because it is the iconic race on the Australian calendar,” he said.

“Australian trainers winning it now are a lot fewer and far between, and there are so many great trainers who haven't won the race. You look at John Hawkes and Brian Mayfield-Smith, and no matter how good you are, there is no rule that you are going to get one.

“John had Maluckyday who nearly won it (in 2010), and Brian had Maybe Royal, who got ran over by the two Japanese horses (in 2006).”

The one thing that O’Brien is certain about is that while the Melbourne Cup remains the race he and other Australian trainers will always want to win, the globalisation of the race has made it less accessible for locals.

“We can no longer identify with each of the runners,” he said.

“There used to be a bit of a journey where every racing fan would watch a horse have its first start, follow it through the Derby and see it come back as a four-year-old.

“I remember backing Saintly (in 1996) and Might And Power (in 1997) and having a really good opinion of them. You would over the moon when they won the Cup.

“Nowadays, if you are sitting there and Almandin or Rekindling or Cross Counter wins, it's not personal for me, anymore.

“We were all excited with Michelle Payne and Prince of Penzance and we all remember Media Puzzle’s win because of Damien Oliver. But the last three wins have been Lloyd Williams, Lloyd Williams and sheik Mohammed.

“The race probably lacks the diversity of story that you have had for 100 or more years before that.”

That’s a storyline that a rejuvenated O’Brien would dearly love to revive if he can get his passed-in, locally-bred horse to win Australia’s greatest race, or potentially even the Caulfield Cup.