🔒 🔒 $1 million to win $9.6 million – Hopewell Rock tops Melbourne Cup Call of the Card

Hopewell Rock, the Irish-bred and British-trained stayer owned by Wathan Racing, attracted a $1 million bet at the Melbourne Cup Call of the Card at the Palladium at Crown on Monday as leviathan Irish billionaire JP McManus spread his investment across several runners.

The $1 million wager took some work to come to fruition, but eventually three of the four bookies on stage agreed to share the $9.6 million potential payout on the George Boughey-trained five-year-old, who was most recently runner-up in the Ebor Handicap.

McManus, betting via his associate Paul Byrne, was by far the day’s biggest punter, backing his own horse Goodie Two Shoes to win $2 million along with local hopes Soul Of Spain, Zakouma, So You Are and Point Of Law.

Byrne said the Call of the Card event was like nothing else in global racing and represented a rare event for serious punters to bet with unfettered access.

“You don’t realise how lucky you are. We have to go home now and get used to having 300 bucks on a horse and be happy to get it,” Byrne told The Straight.

“You should be very proud of your bookmakers and your culture that you still have.”

Byrne said that Hopewell Rock stood out as the best credentialed of the overseas horses and had been the runner they wanted to back.

“We think he’s got the best European form. Coming out of the York and the Ebor is a good trial you’ll get. He has a great trainer (George Boughey),” he said.

“But we were keen to give the bookmakers a fair chance with spreading it out across a number of horses.

“There was no point in coming in and asking them to lay one horse to lose it. Fair is fair. We decided to pick out a couple and spread it around as much as we could.”

Interestingly, they didn’t back McManus’ own horse Trustyourinstinct, who is currently $8 favourite for the race.

Prominent local punters were also active on the day. A table led by Wolfden’s Kingsley Bartholomew and Adam Sparrow as well as Matthew Elliott and social media punter Benny Scarf was heavily involved throughout betting.

Among those they backed was Enfjaar, with bookmakers taking one bet to win $2.25 million on the $26 chance.

Tom Waterhouse was also busy backing several runners, including Juja Kibo, Enfjaar, Zahrann and So You Are.

The headline bet at last year’s function was a $500,000 win bet on the Joseph O’Brien-trained Al Riffa at $8. Lester accepted it from a representative of Easygo, for a potential return of $4 million. Al Riffa was beaten, and the McEvoys’ Half Yours won the Cup under Jamie Melham.

Byrne said the Call of the Card was a unique event which should be developed further.

“You have to protect it. When you go back, you say to people, you can’t believe what they’re doing out here. The opportunity to go and have a decent bet on a horse. We’re starved of it. All I can say is protect it,” he said.

“The Melbourne Cup is a great race. It’s the competitive nature of it. Everyone’s got a chance. Everyone can find an angle to the race.”