There are certain horses that rattle the cages of even the most stoic in this sport, and the stout-hearted, walnut-coated Rubiton is one of them.
It helps that the horse did his thing as recently as the 1980s and, as such, is a living memory for so many. But it’s also unusual, in this impatient day and age, for a stirring and seasoned track champion to succeed so well in the covering shed.
Rubiton was born on October 18, 1983, bred by Oamaru Stud in South Australia. He was a son of Century, in turn a son of the wildly successful Better Boy (Ire), and this was a male-tail sireline that kicked straight back to the Byerley Turk of the late 1600s.
Gallery: Images of Rubiton's sire, Century and grandsire, Better Boy (Ire)
The Byerley Turk sireline, it is believed, delivered courage and spirit to the modern thoroughbred, and it also delivered a consistently dark-bay coat. Both Rubiton and Century were brown or near-black stallions.
Rubiton was sold as a yearling in Adelaide to the Morphettville racehorse trainer Pat Barns, who paid $45,000 for the horse on behalf of new owners. The colt didn’t race until a very early 3-year-old, but thereafter, it was brilliance on top of consistent brilliance.
Rubiton won his first three starts, and the G1 Futurity S. at his seventh. In the spring of 1987, he won the Manikato S., Memsie S., Feehan S. and Underwood, and then the Cox Plate and Mackinnon at his final two starts. He won 10 races out of 16 and was unplaced only once, and his $1.36 million in prizemoney was a lucrative load for the times.
Rubiton | Image courtesy of the MVRC archives
None of these facts share the manner in which Rubiton won his races. His Cox Plate was won in track-record time, and his big frame cornered the courses of Melbourne like a rally car, his regular pilot Harry White pleading with the inside rein.
“He is the most exciting horse we’ve had here since Tobin Bronze,” White said in the early spring of 1987. By the end of it, with the Cox Plate in his pocket, the jockey said his horse would win “anywhere in the world and would cope with any race up to 2000 metres, possibly 2400 metres”.
Rubiton ran into the likes of Vo Rogue (Ivor Prince {USA}), Placid Ark (Arkenstone), Special (Habituate {Ire}) and Military Plume (NZ), and, had a tendon injury not spelled the end of him in early 1988, he would have run into many more.
Throughout his career, Rubiton was owned by David and Rod Baylis, with Mike Willesee’s Trans Media Stud buying in through 1987. It meant the stallion went to Trans Media, now Olly Tait’s Twin Hills Stud, for his initial stud duties in 1988. When Willesee sold out in 1995, Rubiton moved to Blue Gum Farm.
Mike Willesee's Trans Media Stud in 1990
The horse covered 18 books of mares from 1988 until 2005, getting 42 stakes winners and horses like Fields Of Omagh, Flavour, Lucky Secret and Rubitano. They were winners of the Newmarket, Cox Plate, Underwood S., Summer Cup, Fernhill H., Maribyrnong Plate and TJ Smith S.
Rubiton wasn’t as dazzling a sire as Danehill (USA), or as perennial as Bletchingly and Marscay, but he was consistent and he became, as did many of the Byerley Turk sireline, an extraordinary broodmare sire. Among horses from his daughters are the likes of Dash For Cash, Redzel (Snitzel) and Flying Artie.
When Rubiton died at Blue Gum Farm in November 2005, put down with a coffin bone infection, no one could have guessed that the sireline would largely go with him. As good as his daughters were, he left no commercial sire sons in his wake, which is a great shame for the Byerley Turk bloodline.
The Rubiton S. was initiated in his honour in 1989, an 1100-metre dash that has been won by no less than Lankan Rupee (Redoute’s Choice), Chautauqua (Encosta De Lago) and Nature Strip (Nicconi). It throws distinct, high-end honour to a horse richly deserving.
