Cox Plate stake up

Press, 29 May 1982, Page 17

Cox Plate stake up

NZPA staff correspondent Sydney The W. S. Cox Plate has been re-established as Australia's premier weight-for-age event with a rise in prize money to $275,000.

The $75,000 increase makes it Australia’s second richest race for this year with only the $310,000 Melbourne Cup carrying greater prize money.

The Caulfield Cup prize money has also recently been raised to $250„000.

The Moonee Valley Racing Club chairman, Mr Bill Stutt, who announced the increase, said he felt Weight-for-age racing had been slipping behind handicaps in the prize money race.

“The biggest stakes are for handicaps but they don’t go to the best horse, unless the top weight wins,” he said. The Victoria Racing Club has yet to announce if it will increase prize money for the Melbourne Cup. The Sydney

Turf Club has announced that next year’s Golden Slipper Stakes for two year olds will be worth $300,000. The Cox Plate, raced at Moonee Valley on October 23, has attracted top-class fields in recent years and has been regarded as the measuring stick for the best horses.

Kingston Town, Australia’s first million dollar stakes earner, won the last two Plates, while other winners have been Dulcify, Surround, Family of Man and Battle Heights. The immortal Phar Lap accomplished the double in 1930-31, a feat emulated by Tobin Bronze in 1966-67. The stake for the S.T.C.’s Tancred Stakes (2400 m in the autumn was increased to $200,000, then the same as the Cox Plate, but with its latest rise, the Cox Plate has again been placed in its premier position for weight-for-age racing.