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HOMETOWN hero Doriemus and brilliant rider Damien Oliver re-asserted Australian authority in the $11 million Melbourne Cup at a rain-lashed Flemington yesterday.

The Caulfield Cup winner completed the fabulous spring Cups double and saw off the overseas challenge of Double Trigger and the gallant Vintage Crop, but trainer Lee Freedman had also done his European homework.

Freedman kept Doriemus out of the Mackinnon Stakes on Saturday and gave a typical European-style preparation to both the winner and fourth-placed Quick Ransom.

And Doriemus was given a superb ride by Oliver, rightly hailed as the country's best, who overcame the extreme outside draw and the officially heavy ground to score by a commanding four lengths in the 3,200-metre epic.

While Doriemus justly earned his place in the spotlight there was almost as much talk about the placegetters as the winner.

Nothin' Leica Dane defied the odds to take second place just a neck ahead of the Mick Kinane-ridden Vintage Crop. No three-year-old has won the race since 1941 and he was backing up after a hard-fought win in the VRC Derby four days previously.

Nothin' Leica Dane will now be spelled with an autumn campaign in Sydney in mind but there are also plans afoot to send him to England for a crack at major European races.

Vintage Crop, the history-making 1993 winner, came from last to finish third having looked no chance in the run. He did not jump with the field and virtually refused to race in the early stages before producing a fighting finish that saw him swamp three-quarters of the field.

Kinane said: 'In the end the horse was the winner. He has a ton of courage and that's what brought him through. He is a nine-year-old with a back problem who was not happy in the gates.

'He missed it and did not want to get into the race at all. I was pushing from very early and he wasn't having it. Then, when I got him going along the back, one dropped back on to me.

'Coming to the turn, I knew we were going to be in the money but you can take nothing away from the first two, although I thought I might have been able to get second.'  Trainer Dermot Weld, who was making his third Australian trip with Vintage Crop, said: 'I am proud of my horse. He has let nobody down.' Winning jockey Oliver, no stranger to Hong Kong and due another stint later in the season, was ecstatic.

'The horse is a fighter with a ton of class. It is the greatest moment of my life so far, it's hard to believe that I've actually won the Melbourne Cup,' he said.

'The last 100 metres was the longest I have ever faced in any race I have ridden in because I realised that I was going to win the Cup. I couldn't hear anything coming and nothing did.' Trainer Gai Waterhouse, bidding again to become the first officially licensed woman trainer to land Australasia's greatest race, saw her father's insistence in running Nothin' Leica Dane vindicated with the result.

The legendary Tommy 'T. J.' Smith, a part-owner of the horse, wanted it to start, never having forgotten that the mighty Tulloch had been denied a chance for the Melbourne Cup after winning the VRC Derby in 1957. He was also reported to have struck a bet worth A$475,000 if Nothin' Leica Dane won both races - after the colt won his first race, a Warwick Farm maiden.

'He is a great horse and I truly mean that. This is his first preparation and he has won the VRC Derby and finished second in the Melbourne Cup. I was so happy with the way he ran,' Waterhouse said. Nothin' Leica Dane could become a real Australian champion. He is very big for a three-year-old and must have a tremendous career ahead of him after doing so well so soon. Yet another superb son of boom sire Danehill, he did not race at two.

Top British and European stayer Double Trigger was the subject of a major drama when a pre-race blood sample was returned unclear. Flemington stewards were told by trainer Mark Johnston that nothing had been administered to the horse and let him run.

But it was Double Trigger's only flirtation with the headlines yesterday. Ridden forcefully up on the pace, he folded up well before the home turn and was very quickly beaten. He finished 17th.

Last year's winner Jeune, with Wayne Harris again up, was never a serious factor and was eventually 15th in the 21-runner field. Desert Chill and Gossips were the two Cup scratchings out of a massive 47 withdrawals from the meeting due to the ground, officially listed as heavy.

Bullwinkle, British champion jockey Frankie Dettori's ride, finished 10th.

The heavy ground put paid to many hopefuls in both the Cup and other races on the programme and kept the crowd down to just over 70,000.

But VRC racing manager Les Benton, who has masterminded the European participation in the race over the past three years, said: 'It has been a real success again because there is nothing like the Melbourne Cup.

'I thought Vintage Crop put in a fantastic performance but Australia can be proud of both Doriemus and Nothin' Leica Dane. What's the runner-up going to be like in this race when he's four or five if he keeps going like this?' 



Stayer reaps rich harvest