Champion jockey Ryan Moore is coming back to Australia for the Melbourne Cup ride on Irish stayer Bondi Beach.
Trainer Aiden O’Brien has booked Ryan to ride Bondi Beach, part-owned by leading Victorian owner Lloyd Williams, in his second assault on the Melbourne Cup.
He has raced only four times this year – all in races over 2400m or longer - for successive wins in the Listed Martin Molony Stakes and G3 Vintage Crop Stakes at Limerick and Navan in April and May before his more recent third placings at Leopardstown in the G3 Ballyroan Stakes and G3 Enterprise Stakes at his latest start on September 10.
Bondi Beach leaves quarantine in the UK on Thursday for the flight to Australia and is due to land in Melbourne on Saturday. He goes to the Werribee quarantine centre for two weeks after his arrival.The Melbourne Cup will be the first time Ryan Moore has ridden Bondi Beach. The stayer was ridden last year by Hong Kong-based Brett Prebble, a jockey boasting a long and successful association with Lloyd Williams including a Melbourne Cup win for him on Green Moon in 2012.
Prebble may be called on to ride another of the Williams-owned entries in this year’s Melbourne Cup. Williams also has Almandin, The United States, Gallante, Aloft, Assign and Foundry – all prepared by his private trainer Robert Hickmott - among the 52 horses still in contention for a Melbourne Cup start.Moore was the star of the spring carnival in 2014 when he lived up to his reputation as one of the world’s best big race riders with victories on Adelaide in the WS Cox Plate at Moonee Valley and Protectionist in the Melbourne Cup.
He also has two fifth place finishes in the Melbourne Cup on Mount Athos on 2012 and Dandino in 2013 and finished 23rd on Snow Sky last year.
