Two-time Melbourne Cup winning trainer Sheila Laxton is ready to take on the world with champion horse ‘Knight's Choice’. Laxton, who is still in disbelief, says the horse is a 'freak' – and what's made the win even more memorable, his humble beginnings.
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00:00Every year, the Melbourne Cup writes a new fairy tale, but it'll be hard for future winners
00:06to get close to this one, and trainer Sheila Laxton believes it's still just the first
00:11chapter.
00:12He's a real athlete.
00:13I've never known a horse like him.
00:14He's a freak.
00:16Maybe he can go on to create history like Winkstead and Farlap and who knows?
00:22Knight's Choice is a five-year-old girl team with a cheeky temperament.
00:25Laxton and her co-trainer and husband, John Simons, picked up Knight's Choice for just
00:30$85,000 and yesterday he went on to win the $4.4 million prize.
00:37You don't have to be a favourite.
00:38You don't have to be from Europe.
00:40You don't have to be costing $2.2 million or whatever.
00:43Laxton now has a perfect strike rate in the race that stops the nation, her first win
00:48coming 23 years ago.
00:50But this one was unpredictable and it started more than 1,250 kilometres from Flemington
00:56in Wolka, northern New South Wales, with Norman and Dianne Baisley.
01:01It's a bit of a passion.
01:02I'm 76 years of age and it's a hobby.
01:06The Baisleys purchased his dam or mum, Midnight Pearl, for just $1,000.
01:11I knew when I bought it for $1,000 I got a bargain buy.
01:14The rest is history, isn't it?
01:17A budget buy with a priceless story, but like all good fairy tales, this one needed
01:21some magic and jockey Robbie Dolan delivered.
01:24I don't know, it was just weird stuff happening this week where I was just a bit superstitious
01:28that something was going to happen and yeah, it just did.
01:32Knight's Choice will now have a well-earned break before potentially eyeing a spot in
01:36the Japan Cup.
01:37We sit down and work out what's going to be best for him in the long run.
01:42As I say, he's pulled up really well, he's really fit and he's done that on his year.
01:47He's just a freak horse.