Racing: Who else, but Elsu

For Elsu ignorance is bliss.

He cannot read the paper or watch television. He can't be psyched out by the weight of public expectation or the soiled pages of the history book. He, unlike any other elite Kiwi athlete, can not tell an Australian from a Kiwi.

In fact, he doesn't know what a Kiwi is. Because Elsu is a horse. A very good horse, a champion, in fact.

But still a horse.

Tonight at Alexandra Park he will start an Interdominion campaign which in two weeks could make him the most valuable standardbred to ever race in this country.

If he wins the $750,000 pacing final on March 18 he will take his earnings to over $2 million, making him the richest New Zealand pacer of all time.

Already he is conservatively worth $4 million. Add his stakes and potential stud earnings together and you have harness racing's $6 million man.

But that is just the base. Win the Interdoms and he gets express entry into the elite US$540,000 ($742,000) Breeders Crown in the United States where victory could double that value.

That would be enough to make a human just a touch nervous. Not to mention your manager, coach, partner, sponsors and the rest of your entourage.

But that is the beauty of Elsu. He lives in his own little world.

For the next two weeks that world consists of four races against the best Australia has to offer, but to Elsu his opponents might as well be from Pitcairn Island. The phrase "transtasman inferiority complex" means nothing to Elsu.

He has never seen Brett Lee turning men into dartboards at 155km/h. Or heard a small bald man spit out the words, "four more years" in the heat of a dying battle. He doesn't know who Wally Lewis is.

Elsu has an advantage many Kiwi athletes would give an arm, or at least a finger, for: He doesn't think.

Which is just as well because if his brain worked like ours it would have shut his body down in last month's A$450,000 Hunter Cup in Melbourne.

The modern day black beauty gave the Aussie horses a 20m headstart and then covered at least 20m more than them. A human would realise that was impossible and freak out. Elsu can't add so he bolted in, making him the most feared horse in racing.

He can sprint - having the fastest mile time of any horse in this year's series. And he has enormous stamina, having won two Auckland Cups.

His trainer Geoff Small says the five-year-old stallion is in perfect condition to give New Zealand a rare win in the Interdoms, racing's holy grail.

So does Elsu realise he is on the verge of greatness, does he have any clue what those TV cameras and airline flights are all about?

"Um, to be honest, no," offers Small, sorry to disappoint. "He is just the same. Eating, sleeping, that sort of thing ... "

Ah, the perfect athlete.

A Kiwi armed with a giant heart, huge lungs and freakish legs powering two wheels.

An equine Sarah Ulmer.

10 reasons why Elsu is one of New Zealand's coolest athletes

1. He is a self-made millionaire and he is only five.

2. He is one of our few athletes who has only one name - just like those really cool Brazilian soccer players.

3. When he retires Elsu will get to spend "quality time" with some of New Zealand's elite female athletes (of the four-legged variety).

4. He will make lots more money for his efforts during that "quality time".

5. His owners let a bunch of schoolkids with crayons design his racing colours.

6. If you Google the word Elsu you get 11,300 matches.

7. He is the perfect athlete to span the racial divide - his face is black and white.

8. The word Elsu could become more synonymous with harness racing than the words Blue Magic.

9. He has never heard of free agency, players unions or inflated career-ending overseas contracts.

10. He kicks Australian butt. Often.