Excelleration wins a thrilling Adelaide Cup

Richard Cully wasn’t able to be on track at Morphettville on Monday to witness Excelleration win the Group 2 Adelaide Cup (3200m), but for those who were, the race did not disappoint.

Fresh off a win in the Group 3 Launceston Cup (2400m), the sparingly raced seven-year-old was again well supported with betting apps to start a $4.40 second-elect with Harry Coffey aboard, and the market got it right with Excelleration denying Jamie Kah aboard The Map ($3.80 fav) by a short half head, with Skelm ($31) further back in third.

The drama started on the way to the gates as topweight and $8 chance Amade got loose and had to be vetted pre-race. After missing the start, Zac Spain was sneaking ground along the inside, ahead of Excelleration, when his irons snapped.

Harry Coffey, following Spain, was full of praise for his fellow rider as Spain managed to extricate off the fence and run on into fourth, with Amade’s trainer Phillip Stokes suggesting the horse should’ve won by five lengths.

“I just had to cop my medicine and I actually had him really well relaxed for the type of horse he is, and then Zac’s (Spain) iron broke and I was like ‘wowee, what am I going to do now?’ because I didn’t know what Zac was going to do and to Zac’s credit he tried to ride a race without any irons and mind you he gave it a good steer because I was following him so I was able to sneak through,” Coffey said.

Excelleration was purchased for just $6000 in the 2018 Adelaide yearling sale and has now won over $600,000 in prize money, with the owners daring to dream of a start in the Group 1 Melbourne Cup (3200m) in November, with Coffey thrilled to be a part of the gelding’s past two wins.

“They were keen to give me a go, the owners and Richie (Cully), just being down in the weights and my ability to ride light at the drop of a hat and my success that I’ve had in Tasmania, they gave me a go and luckily enough I went down,” Coffey said.

“He’s a classy horse and Richie’s a brilliant trainer, he knows what he’s doing so we were a little bit unsure whether we were going to come to Adelaide just with the two weeks between runs but as you’ve seen, it was the right idea.”