Coursing History – Standish Handicap

The five-year-old heads the field for Saturday’s $200,000 Group 3 Standish Handicap (1200m) at Flemington.

The son of Pride Of Dubai will enter rare company simply by running in the Victoria Racing Club’s historic sprint under 60kg.

No horse has won the Standish carrying such a weight since the introduction of metrics in 1973 and the most recent of the nine horses to win with the imperial equivalent – 9 stone 6 – or greater was Gay Saint, who won under 9.9 in 1952.

Just one horse has attempted the feat since the turn of the millennium; former Hong Kong star Good Ba Ba, who ran fourth under 60.5kg at his Australian debut, as an 11-year-old, in 2013.

The next greatest weight carried since 2000 is 59.5kg, which was what Western Empire lumped into seventh position in 2023, while 16 others have run with 59kg.

Catapulted (2012) and Lord Of The Sky (2018) are the winners under that weight, joining Grandiose (1991) as the metric record-holders, while Chattanooga, Adamantium and Aztec Ruler all ran second with a further four third placegetters.

Maharba heads the weights from Lim’s Kosciuszko (59kg) and mare Aviatress (58kg), while Aztec Ruler and Hedged each have 57.5kg with Disneck (55kg) the other with more than the 54kg limit.

The other seldom-achieved feat Maharba is out to pull off this weekend is winning the Standish Handicap first-up from a spell, having not been to the races since finishing second-last in the Group 1 William Reid Stakes at Moonee Valley on March 25.

The most famous Standish performance of all – Iglesia’s 2001 blitz, when he set the 1:07.16 track record that still stands – was by a horse having its first run for the campaign, but the only one in the 25 years since was by Lord Of The Sky.

Sydney visitor Disneck is the other horse resuming in Saturday’s race with most of the 12 runners deep into the campaign.

Among them is early favourite Hedged, who is out to become the latest to complete the Christmas Stakes/Standish Handicap double.

Separated by just six days for more than a century, when the Christmas Stakes was run on Boxing Day and the Standish Handicap on New Year’s Day, the latter was moved to the second Saturday in January in 2022 and two years later Sghirripa became the latest to win both races.