One week on and Luckie is still floating


A week after winning the world’s greatest greyhound race, Luckie Karabitsakos’s feet have barely hit the ground.

In one of the most impressive performances ever seen on the track, Hard Style Rico defeated what many regarded as one of the strongest TAB Melbourne Cup fields ever assembled and did so in track record time.

“It’s slowly sinking in,” he said of his career defining achievement.

“To do what he’d done on the big stage, it’s hard to get your head around. But it is sinking in.”

Hard Style Rico began his career 14 months earlier and immediately showed above average ability. He won his maiden in 25.01 at Ballarat and quickly graduated to city racing where he won four of his first five starts at the Meadows – running 29.80 or faster in each of those wins – making the final of the group 1 Silver Chief at his 11th start.

“I knew the ability of the dog. When we were pretraining and breaking him in, the times he was running were just phenomenal. He ran 5.06, 18.70 around Sandown at 15 and half months and we knew from then this dog had a massive motor. ‘Rockstar’ (Mario) Briganti was with me that day, and we sort of said then that we had our eyes set on the Melbourne Cup.”

Hard Style Rico ran sixth in that Silver Chief final, a race won by Simon Told Helen and also featured Tiggerlong Tonk and Shima Shine. That quartet went on to dominate the Victorian group racing scene over the following 11 months – of the 20 group level sprints for which they were eligible, one of the four featured in 17 of them, winning 11. It was only fitting that they would again meet on the sport’s biggest night of the year.

After running a career best 29.17 to win his heat, Hard Style Rico’s chances in the final appeared to have been dealt a blow at the box draw when he drew the yellow vest which had been carried to victory by just two Cup winners in the previous 30 years. Simon Told Helen was viewed by many as the big winner from the box draw landing box 2, with Shima Shine, Tiggerlong Tonk and West Australian star Tommy Shelby drawn the three outside boxes. Hard Style Rico had no room for error from box 5, and stage of all he delivered the perfect performance.

Beginning flawlessly, he was in front off the mat and ran 4.99 to the first mark, 18.41 to the back and home in 10.499 to set a new time standard of 28.909.

It was a moment that changed Karabitsakos’s life – and that of his family’s – forever.

“It’s life changing – I have lived the dream. I believe that for every trainer, this is the biggest race to win. It’s like conquering Everest for us trainers. You never really think it’s going to become a reality until the day that you’re there and you pinch yourself when you are.

“It changes your life because you’ve achieved something than so many people try all of their life to achieve. I mean, my father tried for 30 years to win this race and I’m blessed and humbled to have a dog with the ability to make a Melbourne Cup, all I wanted to do was get my brother up there and give him a big hug because, look, it was an emotional thing because my father obviously had passed away and he wasn’t around to see it. And as soon as I grabbed my brother I just said ‘We did it!’”

And with the buzz of arguably the greatest TAB Melbourne Cup performance still in the air, Karabitsakos decided that Hard Style Rico retired had run his last race.

“The bond that ‘Bruiser’ and I have – he’s my best friend. He’s like a son to me. I bred him, I reared him, I’ve done everything with him. The bond we have will never break and he’ll be with me until the day one of us shuts our eyes. I said to my family and my close friends that I want to win the Melbourne Cup with him. That was my goal and we’ve achieved it. He made it to the top .

“Prior to the Cup we had no plans for retirement. But the way he won the race against one of the best fields you could assemble – you won’t see another field like that in the Melbourne Cup – we thought, ‘you know what, there’s nothing else to achieve, nothing else to prove.

“It was a really hard decision. The way he pulled up after that run, he could go out break another track record I have no doubt. But there’s a high demand for Bella Infrared (Hard Style Rico’s sire) so we made the decision that this dog can relax and go to stud duty.”

Hard Style Rico retires with a career record of 21 wins from 40 starts including three group race wins and two track records, and joins fellow TAB Melbourne Cup finalists Dyna Double One, Ando’s Mac, Aston Dee Bee, My Redeemer and Whiskey Riot in the stud ranks.

Luckie Karabitsakos enjoys the best 28.909 seconds of his greyhound training career
Mick Floyd
About Mick Floyd - Mick is the Racing and Media Manager at Sandown Park and has 15 years of experience in the sport. He has a finely tuned talent for finding three legs of a quaddie. You can follow his ramblings on Twitter - @mickfloyd
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