Gai's lucky win

Slattery Media ©

Gai Waterhouse has won her first race of the Melbourne Cup Carnival after a protest not involving her horse was upheld in race seven on Crown Oaks Day.

Waterhouse's colt Turf Express (Blake Shinn) finished strongly to miss by a nose in a photo finish to the Mike Moroney-trained Viking Hero (Mark Zahra) with Mark Kavanagh's King Diamond (Michael Rodd) a half-head away third however Rodd fired in a protest against the winner alleging interference over the last 50 metres.

The head-on vision showed Viking Hero laying in on King Diamond and forcing Rodd to take preventative action to avoid impeding fourth-placed Don Jose (Damien Oliver) which was on his inside.

The stewards deemed the interference sufficient to uphold the protest, causing a wholesale rearranging of the placings.

It was a popular decision with punters as the new winner Turf Express was the $4.60 favourite while King Diamond which was promoted to second was second pick at $5. Viking Hero started $17.

The win was Shinn's fourth for Cup week which meant he drew equal with Rodd as the leading rider for the week.

Veteran Queensland jockey Shane Scriven scored his second win for the week when $5 equal favourite Burdekin Blues led throughout to win race eight. Scriven barely had to wave the whip at his horse as they sailed across the line, one and three-quarter lengths clear of $21 Let Loushe (Danny Nikolic) with $8 Happy Glen (Dean Holland) two lengths away third. The other equal favourite, Keano was a beaten horse with 300 metres to go.

In the final race of the day, Melbourne Cup-winning jockey Corey Brown scored his third win of the week when he got $8 chance Sadalbari up in the last bound over the heavily backed $7 It's Prince (Nicholas Hall) with $8.50 Ship in the Night (Wayne Hokai) a close up third. The $4.60 favourite Berringama was fourth.

The Crown Oaks Day attendance of 80,112 was the smallest Oaks Day crowd since 1998.