A powerful galloper, Theseo was able to claim 5 major Group Ones in a distinguished career

The evening session of the Magic Millions Yearling Sale can be a fast-paced and dynamic event, with buyers returning from a substantial day at the racetrack, ready to identify and acquire potential future champions like Dance Hero, Capitalist, or Sunlight. In 2005, Denise Martin, the owner of Theseo, experienced a defining moment that brought the commotion of the Gold Coast sales ring into sharp focus. It occurred when a chestnut-colored offspring of Danewin entered the scene.

The inexperienced young Theseo surprised his new owner by adapting to his new environment and responding well to trainer Gai Waterhouse's methods more quickly than expected. Consequently, he participated in some of the season's initial two-year-old trials in September 2005.

Fourth on debut in a Randwick maiden over 1100m in February 2006, first and second over the line were none other than Casino Prince and Mentality, who would both become open-age Group 1 winners. Spare a thought then for third placed Coast To The Post, whose two career wins in a Hawkesbury maiden and Newcastle 0-65 were somewhat overshadowed by the collective nine career Group 1s later secured by first, second and fourth that day. 

Casino Prince and Mentality again bested Theseo at his second start, although the margin to first diminished from three lengths to an improved three-quarters of a length. At start number three, it was Mentality and another future Group 1 winner Excites that relegated the Waterhouse colt to third. It in fact took seven starts for Theseo to break through for his maiden victory, winning the 1800m Listed Dulcify Stakes in September 2006. And it turns out a fairly good judge was in the saddle. 

After a Queensland winter campaign that saw Theseo register his first Group win in the G3 Premier’s Cup, the gelding finished a narrow seventh, beaten less than two lengths, in Empire’s Choice’s Queensland Derby. 

But when he returned in the autumn of 2008, he was a fully furnished four-year-old ready to announce himself as a racehorse. He came out second-up in the Magic Millions Cup and he won well from the front, and Nash Rawiller. The first of five Group 1 wins would be achieved the following spring. Following a narrow weight-for-age second to old foe Mentality in the George Main, Theseo was sent out a lightweight $11 chance in the Epsom, with the prophetic Purton booked to ride at 51.5kg. Theseo was rarely out of Group 1 company for the remainder of his 40-start career, and was good enough to win other time-honoured Group 1 Australian races the Mackinnon Stakes, the George Main Stakes and two Ranvet Stakes to add to his Epsom triumph, with Nash Rawiller doing the steering in all but the latter. The outstanding gallopers Mentality, Rangirangdoo, Viewed and Metal Bender were among Theseo’s regular sparring partners. All three of Theseo’s career runner-up finishes were in Group 1 company, including a desperately close defeat at the hands of swooping Niconero in the Australian Cup at Flemington, and a narrow second to the mudlark Fiumicino in the BMW – two more of Australia’s most famous races.

It was Theseo’s will to keep fighting in a tight finish that will remain the legacy of the former star racehorse, who took up a comfortable paddock at his regular spelling farm in Bowral after his career on the track concluded.