For the second consecutive year the Willie Mullins-trained True Self (IRE) missed a start in the Melbourne Cup by one spot before gaining some consolation in the Group III Queen Elizabeth Stakes (2600m) at Flemington.
Given her favoured good ground, True Self (IRE) needed to overcome traffic problems for a well-deserved success.
Carrying the OTI silks, High Bowman was desperate for a run in the straight. Baulked at the 300 metres, Bowman finally found a seam. Full of running, True Self powered home to defeat the heavily backed favourite Pondus (GB) by a length with Chapada the same distance back in third.
It was the first win in six starts for the 8yo daughter of Oscar since capturing the same race last year.
Twelve months back she finished second behind the subsequent Melbourne Cup runner-up Prince Of Arran in the Group III Geelong Cup, which cost her a spot in the big two-miler but gained her a $200,000 bonus for winning the Queen Elizabeth.
With Willie Mullins home in Ireland, stable representative David Casey said the revered trainer would be thrilled.
“He would be delighted. Obviously he was disappointed with her run at Caulfield (13th in the Caulfield Cup) but the soft ground was against her,” Casey said.
The veteran mare remains the lone stakes winner on the flat for the former champion jump sire Oscar.
The son of Sadler’s wells was pensioned four years ago at the age of 21 at Coolmore's’ Grange Stud where he began in 1998.
He had an abbreviated career on the track with his highlight coming when second to the former Coolmore shuttler Peintre Celebre in the 1997 Prix du Jockey Club (French Derby) at his final start.
True Self (IRE) is one of three winners from seven to race out of the unraced Good Thought a daughter of another former shuttler in Mukaddamah.
