SPRING ANOMALY IRKS O'BRIEN

Leading trainer Danny O’Brien remains convinced the Caulfield Cup date should be moved – at least in a switch with the Cox Plate.

O’Brien has long wanted the entire spring carnival moved back a month but he said that if that is not going to happen in the immediate future, the dates for the Cox Plate and Caulfield Cup should be swapped.

“We hear from all these geniuses that the spring carnival is not broken and its worked for 100 years, well, that’s not the case because the Caulfield Cup is in the wrong position and it’s very hard to argue with that,” O’Brien said on Wednesday.

“It’s been a clear anomaly for at least 30 years. The Cox Plate has become a more and more important race at its (Caulfield Cup) expense and no one wants to fix it because we’ve got this attitude of ‘oh, no we can’t change it’.”

O’Brien said he felt racing officials may have missed the boat in the spring discussions to make an adjustment to the program that is long needed and one that would potentially allow his emerging star Russian Camelot the chance to run in spring’s big three races.

“That’s one of the problems that no one wants to address. The Caulfield Cup, in a perfect world, should be after the Cox Plate.

“Every year these horses don’t have the opportunity to run in both because the Caulfield Cup is on the week before.”

The Melbourne Racing Club unsuccessfully lobbied to have the Caulfield Cup and Caulfield Guineas meetings put back to the end of November given the better potential for crowds at that later time and to gain some space away from the AFL finals.

As with most promising three-year-old stayers, O’Brien’s mind is currently open concerning his spring campaign with clear weight-for-age and handicap paths to the Melbourne Cup for such an exciting horse as Russian Camelot.

O’Brien will give the northern hemisphere-bred stayer the chance to impress in both the group 1 weight-for-age Maybe Diva Stakes (1600m) at Flemington in September and then the group 1 set weights and penalties Turnbull Stakes (2000m) before his spring path is confirmed.

“If he shows he can go straight to weight-for-age, then the Cox Plate looms as the logical race for him but ultimately, he has to show he’s good enough,” O’Brien said.

“I mean, he’s had five starts and won a South Australian Derby, so he’s got to keep improving.”

Fellow high-profile trainer Wayne Hawkes also pleaded last month for officials to look at switching the dates for the Caulfield Cup (2400m) and Cox Plate (2040m) to allow a more natural progression to Flemington.

O’Brien said he remained hopeful the recent discussion on the composition of the spring may eventually lead to the changes that are needed around the entire timing of the carnival.

“Certainly, the debate has brought things to the surface and hopefully attitudes will change,” he said.

“I am absolutely convinced the whole thing (spring carnival) starts too soon.

“We begin in winter and we’re finished by the middle of spring. It would be much better, in my opinion, if we had the grand final at the end of November or the start of December.

“Obviously, there would be a few things that need to change but while we have people who want to put their heads in the sand, the move to make improvements just won’t be made.”

Story by Andrew Eddy for Racing.com