Racing: Belle streaks to Horse of Year title

Melody Belle (inner) and Danzdanzdance fight out the finish of the Gr.1 Bonecrusher Stakes. Photo / Trish Dunell

It was the most fitting way for the Horse of the Year title to be won.

The two main contenders to be crowned the best racehorse in New Zealand slogging it out down the Ellerslie straight in a race named after one of the few racing heroes to cross over into the world of New Zealand sporting greats.

That is what we got at Ellerslie on Saturday and once the heart rates returned to normal — both equine and human — the argument was over: Melody Belle will be our Horse of the Year.

Such moments are rare. Often the title of our champion galloper is won on foreign soil or in a race that will eventually drift from our minds. Remarkably last season the race that won Bonneval the title was run on October 1, almost 11 months before the trophy was presented to her connections.

Not that there is anything wrong with the HOTY title being decided by Australian performances. Any group one victory there should probably carry double voting points as they are so hard to achieve and getting harder.

But there was something almost poetic about Saturday's Bonecrusher Stakes, a race that the champ himself would have loved, at the home of racing on the last true day of a special summer of racing.

Melody Belle, with the slightest of doubts over her stamina in a 2000m group one on a track that quickly became a Heavy10, versus Danzdanzdance, who had won the Zabeel Classic under those exact same conditions on Boxing Day.

Melody Belle's rider Opie Bosson produced a masterclass, saving ground before easing wide when he needed to while Craig Grylls on Danzdanzdance tried to stalk him everywhere he went.

At the top of the straight the stage was set: a mare who had won four group ones this season leading with the mare who had won two group ones alongside her, so close they could smell each other's sweat.

After a taxing season and a rollercoaster summer Melody Belle could have been forgiven for buckling, there would have been no shame in that.

But she took everything her arch rival threw at her and kept going forward.

At the line the winner was holding and the title was hers, won on our best track in our best race of the season and the HOTY trophy will fittingly be presented just 100m from where this battle of the equine amazons took place.

Not only was it our race of the season but one of the most spine-tingling races New Zealand has had in years. We rarely see our two contenders for the title knuckle down in racing at its purest form.

If you didn't enjoy the closing 300m of the Bonecrusher Stakes then move on, nothing to see here, horse racing simply isn't for you.

Melody Belle will now have a break and be set for the Hawke's Bay triple crown in the spring and if she returns in Saturday's form a Winx-less Cox Plate is a realistic option.

"She was brave there and she loves a fight," said Bosson, who surpassed his childhood riding hero Lance O'Sullivan as our most successful group one jockey with the victory, his second group one in an hour.

Bosson heads to Sydney for the next two Saturdays and maybe more, with one of his key rides likely to be Danzdanzdance in the Ranvet at Rosehill in 12 days.

That $5000 mare could have snatched the HOTY title away from Melody Belle during their tough mudder battle on Saturday but considering the race was almost an afterthought for her and she raced a touch fresh, she lost no admirers.

"I think I got a head on Melody Belle at the 150m mark but she fought back," said Grylls, knowing he had done all he could.

While Rondinella played a minor supporting role in third place her performance in her first group one suggested the big plans her trainers have for her next season are realistic.

New Zealand race fans should have some special female gallopers to cheer on next term when you add in the likes of Probabeel, Glory Days and maybe even a returning Avantage to mention but a few.

But the bar has now been set very high, after no New Zealand thoroughbred won more than one group one race last season Melody Belle has won five of them in 190 days, three in the last month.

We may not see that again for a long, long time.

And we may not see a race quite like Saturday's Bonecrusher Stakes for a while either. But we can only hope.

Group one girl: Melody Belle's season

• Sept 1: $200,000 Tarzino Trophy, Hastings.

• Sept 22: $200,000 Windsor Park Plate, Hastings.

• Feb 9: $200,000 BCD Group Sprint, Te Rapa.

• Feb 23: $200,000 Haunui Farm Classic, Otaki.

• March 9: $200,000 Bonecrusher Stakes, Ellerslie.