156 years ago, Adam Lindsay Gordon won three steeplechase races in one afternoon at Flemington, on 10 October 1868
156 years ago, the horseman/poet Adam Lindsay Gordon, on the final day of the VRC Spring Steeplechase meeting at Flemington, Melbourne, 10 October 1868, won the three main events of the day.
Because of his poor health at the time, having suffered some recent bad falls, Lindsay Gordon considered himself ‘scarcely fit to ride a donkey’. However, he won the Melbourne Hunt Club Cup on his friend Major Baker’s big brown gelding Babbler, and then the Metropolitan Steeplechase on Viking, followed by the Selling Steeplechase, on which he rode his faithful Cadger to victory by more than two lengths. Cadger was then sold to the highest bidder for £40. A memorial plaque to honour this achievement was unveiled at Flemington Racecourse on 3 November 1956 by then Victorian Governor Sir Dallas Brooks.
Also, to commemorate Adam Lindsay Gordon’s contribution to the sport of horse racing, in particular steeplechasing, in South Australia and Victoria, on 20 September 2014 he was posthumously inducted into the Australian Jumping Racing Association’s Gallery of Champions.