The Cox Plate winner, the Everest winner, the horse of the year, and of course FISHER. The VRC’s decision to load up the last day of its Melbourne Cup carnival has been handsomely rewarded.

If only the weather gods would come to the party (a dubious prospect at press time), a bumper crowd would be guaranteed to send off the week.

Admittedly two of the three horses mentioned are likely to stifle betting in their respective races, but it might just be a value opportunity for the punters given the results for odds-on favourites in big events this spring.

The other, Cosmic Crusader, will be looking to become the third successive Cox Plate winner to take the Champions Stakes a fortnight later, the sort of scenario VRC planners would have been dreaming of when they reconfigured the carnival a decade ago.

Before Via Sistina did it in 2024 and 2025, the last horse to complete that double was So You Think in 2010, when the Champions Stakes was called the Mackinnon and run on Derby day.

The idea behind moving the Mackinnon in 2016 — while pumping up its prizemoney — was to give the major players from the Cox Plate an extra week and extra incentive to go around one more time.

The only Cox Plate winner to take up the offer in the first eight years of the new format was Anamoe, who started a $2.35 favourite in the 2022 Champions Stakes and ran fourth to Zaaki.

In Saturday’s Champions Sprint, Tempted is also bidding to become the third horse to complete a significant double, after Everest winners Redzel (2017) and Nature Strip (2021).

Autumn Glow will be following in the hoofsteps of last year’s King Charles III winner, Ceolwulf, if she can follow up with victory in the Champions Mile.