The Melbourne Cup will again stop the nation as a score of horses vie to win the prestigious cup.
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When the winner crosses the line, Nhill's Mick Robins, 93, will share with another trainer the sea of emotions that comes with winning the cup.
After all, the boy from Broken Hill won the Melbourne Cup in 1968 and 1969.
Born in 1930, the year Phar Lap won the Melbourne Cup, the oldest living Melbourne Cup-winning trainer lives and breathes horse racing.
He started trackwork as a teen in Broken Hill. He tried his hand as an amateur jockey, but he was too heavy to pursue the trade seriously, so he moved to training.
He won 17 races with Sir Haydon and approached legendary trainer Bart Cummings for a job. After being knocked back, he was offered a stable foreman role with Grahame Heagney in the early 1960s.
In 1968, Heagney was lured to the United States, and Robins was handed the reins to a stable of 14 horses.
"When I won the Cup, they thought I was a lucky trainer, because I only took out my Melbourne licence three months earlier," he said.
"But I had held a trainers licence since 1950. I started training Rain Lover in June '68, but to race in the Spring racing carnival, I needed to get a Melbourne licence."
With a trainer's license renewing in August, Robins needed to pay for two to partake in the Melbourne Cup.
"I kept training him at the stables under Grahame Heagney's name," he said.
The 1968 Cup
Robins brought Rain Lover to Melbourne and looked to Cummings for inspiration, who had won three consecutive Melbourne Cups, with Light Fingers (1965), Galilee (1966) and Red Handed (1967).
"Bart always said, 'You got to run on a Saturday before the Melbourne Cup', so I had Rain Lover in the Mackinnon Stakes (now VRC Champions Stakes)."
With placings in the Craiglee, Underwood and Caulfield Stakes, Robins' head was on the chopping block.
"Had it not won the Mackinnon Stakes, I think Rain Lover would have had a new trainer for the Melbourne Cup."
Robins had Jim Johnson ride Rain Lover on the big day; the silky was no stranger to the stable, having won the Melbourne Cup on Gatum Gatum for Grahame Heagney in 1963. However, the pairing wasn't Robins' first choice.
"I had Roy Higgins ride for me earlier on Rain Jewel and won some races in Melbourne," he said.
"While he wasn't tied up with Bart Cummings, he did ride a lot of horses for him; he wrote me a beautiful letter saying he couldn't just jump off Bart's horses to ride one of mine for the Cup.
"The owner of Rain Lover said get Jimmy Johnson on that horse. When Rain Lover came out on Tuesday, he ran a race record and won the Melbourne Cup by eight lengths.
"Bart Cummings was one of the first to congratulate me; even though he was only two years older than me, he said 'good race, son'.
"For many years afterwards, Jimmy would say to me, 'There wasn't a horse in the world that could have beat Rain Lover on that day'.
"I knew it was a chance, but I didn't expect it to win. Plenty of horses can win over a mile and a half, but you have to be a special horse to win over to miles."
Locked in as Rain Lover's trainer, Robins would win eight races across the next 12 months, including the Craiglee, Underwood and St George stakes with the stallion.
The 1969 Cup
The lead-up to the 1969 Melbourne Cup was starkly different compared to 12 months earlier.
"We run him in the Mackinnon Stakes again on the Saturday before the Cup," Robins said.
"But in a field of just five, he came fifth. I said he would struggle on Tuesday, but Jimmy said he'd be better over two miles, and he was right."
Rain Lover's most prominent foe was New Zealand stallion Big Philou, the heavily back favourite trained by Bart Cummings.
However, 39 minutes before the race, Big Philou was scratched, allegedly poisoned by one of Cummings' team.
Carrying nine stone and seven pounds (60kg), Rain Lover would go on to beat Alsop by a nose, in turn becoming the first horse to win back-to-back Melbourne Cups since Archer in 1861 and 1862.
"After we won the second cup, we came home to Adelaide," he said.
"I was leasing the stable and had to move out. While he didn't show it, Grahame Heagney would have to feel a bit dirty that he gave away a horse that won two Melbourne Cups."
Rain Lover retired from the track in 1970 with 17 wins and 17 placings from 46 starts, earning $188,651 in prize money, then second on the list of money winners.
"I got a couple of new owners and won the Adelaide Derby in 1970, and the South Australian Oaks with Rain Amore, the sister to Rain Lover," Robins said.
"I had a fair bit of luck, and like everything else, it went quiet for a while. It's like a football team, you have to keep bringing in the young ones otherwise you're battling."
Robins would go on to mentoring, offering insights to trainers across the country for many years.
When I left Broken Hill, if someone was to say this boy would go on to win the Melbourne Cup, you'd ask him which mental asylum he was from.
- Mick Robins, two-time Melbourne Cup winning trainer
List of wins for the oldest living Melbourne Cup winning trainer:
- Melbourne Cup (1968, 1969) with Rain Lover
- Mackinnon Stakes (1968) with Rain Lover
- South Australian Derby (1969) with Dale Lace
- Adelaide Guineas (1970) with Chiming
- Werribee Cup (1972) with Chiming
- Darwin Cup (1982) with Plain Mick
Ben Fraser
Ben is the Editor with the Wimmera Mail-Times, Stawell Times-News and Ararat Advertiser. Ben is the former chief of staff at the Portland Observer, a qualified teacher, and an Leadership Great South Coast alumni (2019).
Ben is the Editor with the Wimmera Mail-Times, Stawell Times-News and Ararat Advertiser. Ben is the former chief of staff at the Portland Observer, a qualified teacher, and an Leadership Great South Coast alumni (2019).
