CARL POIDEVIN unloads Get Up Jude from the single horse float he has driven into the dusty car park at Mornington racecourse, about 60 kilometres south-west of Melbourne, and leads him to the stalls. In the next hour he will fulfil the roles of trainer, stablehand, track-rider and clocker as he prepares the battle-scarred five-year-old for the first of what he hopes will be two momentous days at Flemington.
Poidevin has brought Get Up Jude from the family stables at Kembla Grange in Wollongong, where he is trained by his wife, Diane Poidevin-Laine, to Melbourne in pursuit of the great - if now somewhat modified - Australian racing dream.
Once it was every owner and trainer's ambition to win the Melbourne Cup. Now, with a likely record nine foreign raiders running this year, the customary contingent of talented New Zealanders and the predominance of the big money locals, it's an achievement just to gain entry to the 24-horse field.
One of the big locals is Lloyd Williams, who prepared last year's winner Efficient at his state-of-the-art training complex. So Get Up Jude will be something of a throwback if he can get a Melbourne Cup start by winning the SAAB Quality at Flemington today. An old-fashioned Melbourne Cup battler.
As Poidevin swims the gelding through the functional concrete pool at Mornington, he is told Williams has installed sun lamps over the indoor pool at his stables so his horses don't get too cold. "Geez, we don't have anything like that at home," he says. "Sometimes it's so cold you can see the mist come off their coats. But I've never had one that wouldn't go in."
Dave Tregonning is happy to claim the battlers' title for the horse despite the fact he and the other owners are successful, self-made businessmen. "[The owners] have all battled, the trainers have battled and the horse itself, he's really a battler," say Tregonning, who first spotted Get Up Jude after stopping to help veteran Wollongong trainer Elsie Green load her horses.
"She had a property on the way to where I worked and I'd give her a hand," he says. "I liked him because he was always getting hurt."
A wilful horse, Get Up Jude tore the flesh from two legs on corrugated iron and once lunged into a fence post almost piercing his heart. "He was lucky it missed his vital organs," Tregonning says. "The gash was so big I could have stuck my whole hand into his chest. And I've got a pretty big hand." The scar is still visible.
So taken was Tregonning by Get Up Jude's irascible nature he bought a quarter share for $2000. When Green could no longer handle him, his wife purchased another quarter and friends Brian, Stan and Paul Gates bought a half-share between them. They then took their unraced $8000 horse to the Poidevin-Laines to see what they could do.
The couple run their Kembla Grange stable of between 25 and 30 horses as a family business with their two oldest daughters riding trackwork and all four children helping out. On Melbourne Cup day last year, Get Up Jude won his first race at Kembla Grange. Victory in the group three Colin Stephen Quality and third place in the prestigious Metropolitan have this year edged him up the Melbourne Cup entry list.
Tregonning and his partners have knocked back more than $500,000 for a half share in their horse figuring the $274,000 they have already won, not to mention the thrill of watching him race, was enough. "There have been offers to buy him and offers from some of the bigger stables in Sydney that want to take him," Tregonning says. "I don't think there is a lot of loyalty in racing. But we've been loyal to the people who've got him this far."
Now, after a disappointing run in last week's Geelong Cup, Get Up Jude must win today to get a start in the Melbourne Cup. The big Flemington track and a more forward ride should suit him. Opinion in the camp is divided on what victory means.
Tregonning, who comes from a tough background where "second place was the first loser", says he only wants to be in the Melbourne Cup to win. Poidevin is just enjoying the journey.
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