{"id":7503,"date":"2023-11-07T09:25:55","date_gmt":"2023-11-07T06:25:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/7503\/without-a-fight-wins-2023\/"},"modified":"2023-11-07T09:25:57","modified_gmt":"2023-11-07T06:25:57","slug":"without-a-fight-wins-2023","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/?p=7503","title":{"rendered":"Without A Fight wins 2023 Melbourne Cup at Flemington"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Without A Fight wins 2023 Melbourne Cup at Flemington\u060c<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Without A Fight won the 2023 Melbourne Cup at Flemington, beating Soulcombe and Sheraz on Tuesday afternoon, giving jockey Mark Zahra a second consecutive victory in the big race.<\/p>\n<p>Trained by father-son team Anthony and Sam Freedman, Without A Fight broke clear with around 300m to go before winning by three lengths as Soulcombe finished on the inside to take second place.  The duo joins his brother\/uncle, Lee, as winning trainers of the <em>race that stops the nation<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s very special, we have had a rich family history [in the race] &#8230;I was here in 2005 when Makybe Diva won her third place and it&#8217;s pretty special to be here,&#8221; Sam Freedman said. <em>Channel 10<\/em>.  \u201cThe home team have done a fantastic job with this horse, he\u2019s really thriving, so a big team effort from everyone.\u201d<\/p>\n<aside class=\"inline inline-photo full\">\n<figure><picture><source data- media=\"(min-width: 376px)\"><source data- media=\"(max-width: 375px)\"><img class=\" lazyload lazyload\" data-image-container=\".inline-photo\" height=\"320\" width=\"570\"\/><\/source><\/source><\/picture><figcaption class=\"photoCaption\">Without A Fight crosses the winning post at Flemington to claim the 2023 Melbourne Cup <cite>Pat Scala\/Race photos via Getty Images<\/cite><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/aside>\n<p>Zahra, meanwhile, had made the decision earlier in the year to leave last year&#8217;s winner Gold Trip, who stepped back again to defend his title on Tuesday, with the jockey also completing the Caulfield Cup-Melbourne double Cup following Without A Fight&#8217;s triumph in the key prep race last month.<\/p>\n<p>Freedman said although conditions were unfavorable for Without A Fight at the same race last year, everything came together this time ahead of a strong run from Zahra.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI&#8217;m glad Mark stayed, he had a hell of a ride today,\u201d Freedman said of Zahra.  \u201cThe horse is quite extraordinary, and I will say that last year, when he was racing, the ground was not to his liking and he was in speed.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;And we received this horse in a great order and we were able to point him in the right direction. Mark has built a really good relationship with him, I think he will probably stay with him for his future preparations, I hope that we will <a class=\"wpil_keyword_link\" href=\"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/tag\/win\/\"   title=\"win\" data-wpil-keyword-link=\"linked\">win<\/a>.\u2019 I probably don\u2019t have a lot of conversation about it.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s extremely <a class=\"wpil_keyword_link\" href=\"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/tag\/exciting\/\"   title=\"exciting\" data-wpil-keyword-link=\"linked\">exciting<\/a> and I\u2019m proud of the whole team.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Without A Fight is the first horse to win the Caulfield-Melbourne Cup double since Ethereal in 2001.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy main worry was that he was shooting so hard, when people asked me who the bigger opponent was. [was] I said &#8220;it&#8217;s actually him being too enthusiastic&#8221;, [he] \u201cHe comes out cold from the barriers and he is a horse who settles much better on the fence with all the horses lined up around him,\u201d explained Zahra.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;So I took him to the fence and he fell asleep straight away. And I was following three great jockeys actually; I was following Damien Oliver, James MacDonald and Ryan Moore, and even if their horse doesn&#8217;t take you not as far as you think, they will get you where you need to go in a race.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAnd I knew they would, and the inside just kept getting better, and in the Melbourne Cup you <a class=\"wpil_keyword_link\" href=\"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/tag\/start\/\"   title=\"start\" data-wpil-keyword-link=\"linked\">start<\/a> to see them fall from the 1000m. [metres from home] and they start to fall, so it&#8217;s all about charting the right path.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSo I got to where I wanted to be, I got right behind Gold Trip and Vauban, and when I knew I could ride next to Gold Trip to get some clean air, I thought [we&#8217;re home];  last year I was scared at the 200, at the 400 [today] I thought I was right at home here.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Pre-race favorite Vauban failed to make the finish after the leaders set a blistering pace over 2000 meters.  Ashrun completed the minor rankings in fourth position.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Without A Fight wins 2023 Melbourne Cup at Flemington\u060c Without A Fight won the 2023 Melbourne Cup at Flemington, beating Soulcombe and Sheraz on Tuesday afternoon, giving jockey Mark Zahra a second consecutive victory in the big race. Trained by father-son team Anthony and Sam Freedman, Without A Fight broke clear with around 300m to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7504,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[40,1076,4872,610,1536],"class_list":["post-7503","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-sports","tag-cup","tag-fight","tag-flemington","tag-melbourne","tag-wins"],"blocksy_meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7503","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7503"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7503\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7505,"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7503\/revisions\/7505"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wikidollar.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}