Champion by popular choice

The understandable urge to label any emerging racing star as a "champion" has been evident in many quarters since Auckland Reactor's stunning Derby win last Friday.

The assessment has even come from co-trainer Mark Purdon who is not a man given to flights of fancy. However the label depends crucially on definition and champion is a word with more than one.

If I was in Purdon's position of sitting behind a horse with such magic acceleration off a lightning pace, coupled with such a wonderfully smooth gait, I would probably be already agreeing with him. But it is not as simple as that.

That Auckland Reactor is a champion three-year-old is already beyond question.

But surely there is a little way to go yet for the Rolleston rocket to prove a true harness champion.

What, then, is a champion?

To some the horse they bred which has just won a Sunday maiden is one.

To marketing men anything which can win more than five in a row is already there, especially in age group racing.

Trainers and owners naturally are quickly convinced. Others may want to rate Auckland Reactor a hot favourite to become one yet still wanting a powerful closing address to go with the evidence so far.

This time last year Changeover was being acclaimed in many quarters as a champion.

After outstanding performances but defeats in the Ashburton Flying Stakes and the New Zealand Cup (which I selected him to win, as I would Auckland Reactor) as a four-year-old, some of the heat around Changeover appears to have cooled although he could easily resurrect the label in the next few months. He is another example, however, of how autumn excitement does not always produce spring fervour.

Indeed, even while Purdon clearly now rates Auckland Reactor superior in potential to Il Vicolo, his best pacer of the last century, the Mach Three youngster has a way to go to match his predecessor.

Il Vicolo was never beaten at three, winning both the Derbys here and one in Australia.

He had won more than $700,000 and 18 races at the end of his three-year-old career then stepped up and won the New Zealand Cup as a four-year-old and again as a five-year-old.

He won as much in his career as the Australians were recently offering for Auckland Reactor (they will need more now). Yet even now calling him a champion can still buy you an argument.

Part of the excitement around Auckland Reactor is that he is a home-bred horse and did not race at two, both rather unusual these days.

Almost all the modern superstars from Noodlum to Elsu and Changeover, gained valuable experience at that age. One of them, Roydon Glen, had 17 starts at two (three wins) and it is often forgotten that the enormously tough older horse, Gammalite, had been Victoria's leading two-year-old with 11 wins at that age.

Of the others, Chokin had eight starts (seven wins), and Christian Cullen five (four wins). Courage Under Fire was unbeaten after six juvenile starts and then won 16 on the trot as a three-year-old.

Elsu was a comparative duffer at two -- he had eight starts without a win.

In the era before Sires' Stakes and sales racing not racing at two was more common for later superstars.

The most remarkable case was Armalight whose performances at the 1981 New Zealand Cup meeting made her racing mark indelible when it comes to superstars.

She did not win her first race until a December three-year-old (Westport) and was subsequently beaten at Nelson. However, she won 12 races before the end of that season. She did not run at all as a four-year-old and then donkey-licked a New Zealand Cup field at her sixth start as a five-year-old.

The time factor is another pointer to the fact that Auckland Reactor is something extraordinary. The rare perfectly still conditions played a significant role (several of the horses following him home will never go as quick again) but the ease of the win with the fractions he ran was the crunch.

The one remaining question _ given that a horse with a name like Auckland Reactor has an aversion at this stage to right-handed racing _ is how good the opposition really is.

That is always the difficulty in labelling age group stars as champions. My guess is that two could be cups horses at four if asked.

No matter how good they are Auckland Reactor will give them a good old thrashing every time. However, it is when he does it to older horses that we can all finally celebrate the arrival of one of our pacing greats.

We may not have long to wait.

 

- © Fairfax NZ News