Group One winner Mystic Journey’s defeat in a non-black type race at odds of 1-10 turned some punters into paupers, but no Australian galloper cleaned out thoroughbred racing gamblers more than 1939 Rawson Stakes loser Ajax.
It will be cold comfort to the Ladbrokes Stakes punters who viewed Mystic Journey as better than bank interest, but the magnitude of her Launceston loss measured much lower on the Richter Scale than Ajax’s Rosehill reverse 82 years earlier.
Ajax had won 18 consecutive contests between November 1937 and March 1939 before he lined up against only two rivals, Attunga and Spear Chief, in the 1939 edition of the event known in 2021 as the Ranvet Stakes. Ajax, which was bidding to equal the Australasian record of 19 successive victories that Desert Gold and Gloaming held jointly, started at odds of 1-40 but finished half a length behind 33-1 chance Spear Chief with the other 33-1 shot, Attunga, in third place.
Just a fortnight after the end of Ajax’s wonderful winning streak, he bounced back to collect the 1939 All-Aged Plate at Randwick. We will see if $11,000 yearling Mystic Journey, which strung together seven superb successes, including the 2019 Australian Guineas and 2019’s inaugural running of The All-Star Mile, between September 2018 and March 2019, adds to her 12 victories and nearly $4 million in prize money.
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