Does this 200-1 Everest hope represent Australian racing’s rising power?

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Rosie Jilla speaks into her phone. “Hey Siri, play horse sounds,” the assistant trainer demands. The device starts neighing. Suddenly, Jedibeel’s ears prick up, and his head turns to face the studio light (and the phone masquerading as an equine friend). The camera is quick to capitalise.

How many people does it take to help a horse through a photo shoot? The answer, of course, depends on the horse. And while Jedibeel is a thoroughbred of magnificent aesthetics and gentle nature, he is a restless poser.

Jedibeel with Brad Widdup (right) and Lachlan Sheridan (left).

Trainer Brad Widdup has him by the reins, circling at regular intervals to reset for another few seconds of semi-stillness, before the bit gets chomped again, and he tries another swivel to greet the sun beckoning from behind. He knows the mounting yard is back there, just outside the stable, and that is the preferred view.

But it is not the view with the moody lighting, so the settling continues with assistance from Lachlan Sheridan, racing manager for Mulberry Racing, who owns the six-year-old gelding.

Meanwhile, our photographer Wolter makes encouraging clicking sounds with his mouth. More of us hover behind, supplicating and sweet-talking through whatever means available. Jilla, who’s ridden Jedibeel most mornings since he was a yearling, changes tack and asks Siri to play Neil Diamond’s Sweet Caroline (“he likes it”).

Another handler simultaneously restarts the horse sounds on his phone, which sets off several of the real-life horses in the surrounding boxes. So here we all are on a Wednesday morning, a chorus of fake horses and real horses in a Sweet Caroline singalong as if they’re 50,000 racegoers at The Everest just before the starting gates open for the world’s richest race on turf.

It’s a surprisingly fitting scene three days out from Jedibeel’s unlikely debut in the $20 million slot race. Widdup’s first Everest runner, in Mulberry Racing’s recently acquired slot, is most notable for being the rank outsider. On Tuesday, before the barrier draw, he was $101 (Sportsbet); after drawing gate eight of 12, that blew out to $251. By Friday, it had come into $151, and then lengthened to $201.

“If it wasn’t an Everest, you’d be pretty confident in any other sort of race,” Widdup says. “But unfortunately,” he pauses a few beats, as if searching for the right words, then lands on, “best horses in the world.”

The build-up to The Everest’s ninth edition has been all about the “best horses”. Or the “best horse”, considering the singular focus on hot favourite Ka Ying Rising. More than 50 Hong Kong journalists have ventured to Sydney and joined the Australian media contingent documenting every move of the star five-year-old with 13 consecutive wins.

The broad expectation is that Saturday will mark the 14th, under Australian trainer David Hayes, who believes his horse to be “very special” but is also feeling the pressure, similarly to Chris Waller with Winx and Peter Moody with Black Caviar.

Ka Ying Rising gets ready for a run at Canterbury earlier this week.

There are some questions about whether the world’s top sprinter can carry his Sha Tin form overseas, first raised by that third place in his only Australian trial, and fed further this week when “fake news” claiming he wasn’t well sent social media into such a meltdown that the bookies temporarily suspended betting.

James McDonald, arguably the best jockey, says the Hong Kong star is “a weapon” but “this will be the toughest test to date”. At any rate, the only thing on the line is pride, according to owner Leung Shek-kong who, already comfortably a billionaire, has made it clear he does not need the prize money.

McDonald will ride Joliestar, the most fancied of Waller’s trio, alongside Lady Shenandoah and Angel Capital, who will be tested against other picks such as War Machine and Briasa. This is all to say that next to nobody is talking about Jedibeel, summed up in form guides and race previews with statements such as “well below what’s required” and “an undercard type, not a top-tier contender”.

Michael Gregg, owner of Mulberry Racing.

That Widdup isn’t overly nervous about such a personal milestone – he is only the second NSW provincial trainer to saddle up for the showpiece event after Newcastle’s Kris Lees – highlights that this story is not really about Jedibeel. It is actually about the circumstances which led Jedibeel to the barrier next to Ka Ying Rising.

The reason Widdup is not too nervous is that he is already an established, respected trainer and a group 1 winner (Icebath’s 2022 breakthrough at Flemington is framed on his office wall). He served a two-decade apprenticeship, including 10 years as an assistant trainer at Godolphin, before forming his own more intimate outfit at Hawkesbury.

That “very good grounding”, featuring Golden Slipper runners, is what got him hand-picked by a data-driven billionaire businessman. Michael Gregg had made his money investing in just about everything except horse racing, chiefly the ASX-listed software company WiseTech Global, along with biotech GPN Vaccines, Shearwater Capital, and a string of others including Oliver’s Real Foods.

He was also quietly preparing to become an Australian racehorse owner.

“He had a rating system for just horse form, that rated trainers as well,” says Lachlan Sheridan, Gregg’s grandson and Mulberry’s racing manager. “He wanted to pick a trainer who was, I guess, punching above their weight.”

In late 2019, Gregg called Widdup and informed him he was it: an overachieving trainer still small-scale enough to pick up the phone. “He could have went to Gai [Waterhouse] or [another big commercial outfit], but he said he didn’t want to do that,” Widdup says.

The timing was fortuitous for Widdup, whose major owner Damion Flower (an inaugural Everest slot-holder) had recently been arrested during a major drugs bust and accused of importing a commercial quantity of cocaine. He was later sentenced to 28 years in prison. There is no suggestion Widdup had any knowledge of Flower’s actions.

“I was rebuilding,” says Widdup. “I lost a lot of horses. I don’t really want to go down that road, but it [has] come on at a perfect time for me in my career.”

Gregg starting buying horses in Australia and abroad, with Widdup’s expertise supplementing his data. Jedibeel, a son of Savabeel, was purchased in 2021 for $190,000. And, after genetics testing confirmed Widdup’s suspicions that the full-brother to talented stayer Starrybeel might actually be better suited to sprinting, he shortened his work.

In 2023, once Gregg’s hand in the Widdup stable grew, he founded Mulberry Racing (named after the great Italian breeder Federico Tesio, whose farm was replete with mulberry trees). He made its colours the bumblebee black and gold of the historic University of NSW Cricket Club for whom he once played, and appointed Sheridan as racing manager.

Sheridan is 24 years old, and his first summation of his racing experience sounds about as extensive as a punter with a general admission ticket. “I was interested in it from 18 when I’d go to the races with my friends and stuff like that,” he says. “But I was never into racing until we got a couple of horses with Brad, and I started watching it more. And then it wasn’t really until probably 2023 when I got properly introduced to the industry and started learning more.”

Jedibeel with trainer Brad Widdup (right) and Mulberry’s racing manager Lachlan Sheridan (left).

That initial perception shifts when it emerges that Sheridan, at Widdup’s friendly behest, quit his job as a manager at a McDonald’s restaurant and became a stable hand. He drove from the northern beaches to the Hawkesbury and back each day to absorb the Brad Widdup Racing minutiae, familiarise himself with the horses and staff, and gain working knowledge of expenses “all the way down to the cost of shavings for the boxes”.

“So if I ring him up and tell him certain things or problems, he understands,” adds Widdup, who is an avuncular senior presence around Sheridan.

Sheridan now does understand a great deal and acts as Mulberry’s (and Gregg’s) unofficial spokesperson-in-chief. He can speak articulately to just about everything, from the $280,000 water treadmill, the altitude chamber under imminent construction, and the 300-acre farm down the road that Gregg purchased solely for the horses to recover, spell, and, ultimately, retire on.

Welfare is at the heart of it all, and Widdup says the extra one-percenters ensure “we’re going to have what everybody else has got, so no one’s really going to be in front of us as we compete”.

Jockey Kerrin McEvoy will ride Jedibeel on Saturday.

Sheridan knows the data-driven focus of the Mulberry brand as its point of difference, drawing from advances in other industries and applying them to horse racing. In 2024, the year they first acquired yearlings, they utilised a proprietary software to identify a shortlist, which Widdup then inspected and oversaw the requisite vet checks. Now they are building their own system.

Sheridan also knows not to answer questions about exactly how much Mulberry Racing paid for the vacant Everest slot, relinquished by struggling gambling giant The Star earlier this year. The sum is not public, but the absurd demand for the cashed-up Royal Randwick extravaganza suggests it may well have been more than the $700,000 a year Racing NSW generally charges investors.

And that is how we got here. Widdup needed a horse, and the top sprinters were taken. “We did look at it, but the problem was when they actually got the slot, horses like Ka Ying Rising and Briasa [were engaged],” he says. “Joliestar and couple of others are aligned to Chris Waller, then Coolmore and Godolphin have got slots, and they’re big operations, so they try to pick within, so you’re going to get the second or third tier if you’re doing dealings with them.

“Jedibeel’s record’s pretty good. He’s a six-year-old, but he’s probably just starting to put it together now.”

Enter Jedibeel, who has won twice at group 2 level but finished out of the placings in his three group 1 runs, and Widdup saw enough in his last-start fourth in the Premiere Stakes (1200m) to lock him in. Mulberry have also booked the race’s most successful jockey, three-time winner Kerrin McEvoy, and the goal is a top-six finish to break almost even on this year’s slot investment. Then it’s next year and beyond.