Jamie Kah has won much bigger races than the Group 3 Adelaide Cup, but few have been as sweet as her win in Monday’s $300,000 feature.
The South Australian native, who is now based in Victoria, won the 3200-metre event for the first time when she partnered Daqiansweet Junior to victory for Phillip Stokes.
It was one of five wins on the day for the six-time Group 1 winner.
“This is definitely up there,” the 26-year-old said when asked to compare it with her greatest thrills.
“It’s always been a race I wanted to win, I’ve got close before, but to do it back home in front of friends and family, it is very special.”
The Cup win was flanked by Listed Matrice Stakes victory aboard Ironclad and Listed Morphettville Guineas success with Ancient Girl.
Earlier, Kah won the Listed Cinderella Stakes aboard Bistro before following up with victory aboard Tully’s Gold.
Kah had Daiqansweet Junior, the $4.20 favourite, bailed away on the inside but benefitted from Aurora’s Symphony – who was shot around the field in the middle stages by Damien Oliver – and Good Idea ramping things up from the 800m.
Kah extricated a path into the clear rounding the home turn and finished too strongly to score by 1.5 lengths from Tigertiger ($4.60) with Future Score ($17) two lengths away third, just over a length in front of last year’s winner Good Idea ($8.50).
“The first time I sat on him I thought this horse is going to be the ideal Adelaide Cup horse,” Kah, who first rode Daiqansweet Junior in a Moonee Valley win in January, said.
“I could have put him anywhere today. I was really rapt with how strong he was late.”
The win made it back-to-back Adelaide Cup wins for Stokes, who like Kah is a Victoria-based South Australian, and the Pakenham trainer said it was a great thrill to win with the son of Sweet Orange who was Group 3-placed in New Zealand but has been made to race his way through the grades in Australia.
“This horse was going around in a Class 1 at Moe in October,” Stokes said. “(To do this) in one prep, it’s amazing.
“It’s fantastic. It’s my hometown Cup, I got a big thrill out of it last year when I wasn’t here, so it’s good to be here this year.”