We've all seen the fabulous clip from Gai at the Waterhouse Balmain home on the couch cheering home (eventually) – "the filly, the filly" in the Golden Slipper.
Nice she let Channel 7, daughter Kate, grandkids, friends and the chef in on it too.
A bung knee can lead to such television gold and golden results.
Sure, it must be hard watching six and having to shift focus from the punters' favourite and those enormous commercial ramifications with Storm Boy.
Still, that's now a remarkable eight Slippers, a race she not only dominated Saturday (on and off track) but marketed with such natural ease during the week preluding.
But here's a different thought and lead to this story – Gai wasn't the first to put a saddle on this year's heroine, Lady Of Camelot.
Yes, Gai and Adrian plotted that path and Blake Shinn delivered a Formula 1 drive, but at an airport elsewhere on Saturday, Matt Vella was watching his own remarkable Slipper tale evolve.
On his mobile phone. Matt?
Yes. Matt Vella, the fella who broke in Lady of Camelot, also broke in the Blue Diamond winner Hayasugi by the way (OK, she was a Cinderella player in the Slipper).
He pre-trained Holmes A Court too, so Matt had a bit riding on the result.
Some effort.
"We tend to be the forgotten ones," said Vella, who was back breaking again on Sunday morning as we spoke.
And stay tuned for some suggestions for next year's winner a little later.
Not that Vella was blasé about this year's Slipper, merely because he was already on the boards having tuned up Overreach (2013) and Fireburn (2022) to win the world's richest race for racing's youngest babies.
"You wouldn't believe it, we went to Melbourne for a country music concert on Thursday night and I booked the return flights, we were meant to land at 3.30pm and by the time we got out I just saw the last 600m on the phone," he said.
That was the American superstar Lainey Wilson, she won the Grammy for best country album this year (Bell Bottom Country), with daughters Natalie, 12, and Skye, 10, and wife Juliette.
"We all love our country music, at this time of the year you just never get a chance to get away, it's seven days a week, but that's what happened, I'm there on the phone and we are all cheering her home," Vella said.
As special as it was for Vella, it was for his long-term client and supporter Sir Owen Glenn, whose yellow and white colours she carried, just as her mother Miss Debutante did, of course which Vella also broke in for Sir Owen.
"He's the most kind and generous man and when we sat down for lunch one day, I said we need a bigger complex to make this work," Vella said.
And Glenn Haven was bought and born, turning Tony McEvoy's Bylong Park into Vella's on-course factory at Hawkesbury.
And Group 1 winners are created.
"I can't remember how many, sorry, I know that sounds a little flippant maybe, I know
Icebath always gets left out though," he said.
Of course, many an owner has got that first message from the breaker that can only be decoded as "this is the one."
"Look, I know this game," Vella said.
"Many are bullshitting when they say things like that but when I first worked with this filly, I sent Sir Owen and Steve (racing manager O'Connor) a message.
"This filly had something about her. Everything out of the mare was small, but that never worried me, but she had a big girth.
"I remember the first time I put a roller around her and had to let it down the other side. It is very important to a smaller horse. But she just had a deep girth, was smart on her feet, low in her action, that generally tells me they are quick and in control of themselves, great attributes."
So how does this Vella fella, with no family ground horses land here?
His clientele is now the top end market — Newgate, Trilogy, China Horse Club, Segenhoe, Bon Ho (Legend) as decent starters.
"Yes it's 75 per cent top end of the market but I work hard at it, it is seven days a week, I do so much of it myself, give them their first second and third rides before I get the other staff involved but when you are dealing with horses like mine, they generally have brains, some through a sales preparation but breeding and blood gives them brains as a rule," Vella said.
But there is no rich racing bloodlines in Matt Vella's pedigree surprisingly.
"I didn't even know there was horse racing until I was about 12," he said.
"My brothers and sisters have had nothing to do with it, Dad worked on a turf farm, my mother was a stay-at-home mum working in market gardens.
"All I knew was I had an uncle who was a wheeler and dealer in selling ponies at the yards."
Vella was just six but had the sniff of fun. But not a career.
"I just loved going to ride the wild ponies, you'd get thrown everyday but you'd learn to ride them and stick to them," he said.
Nearby was Bart Cummings and Princess Farm.
A young Vella walked into general manager Tim Wash and asked for some work experience. He was 12.
But, along that journey came touch with Mimi Lebrock, So You Think and Viewed and of course the best of tutors in Bart.
Some apprenticeship!
Vella credits now country New South Wales trainer Scott Singleton with driving the career.
"He was a freakish track rider and gave me chance," he said.
All he needed was a "letter from mum", who would then drive him to the farm, take him to school, pick him after school and return him to Princess Farm for more.
The work ethic was instilled.
There was a less than moderate picnic career, one winner from 13 rides, all at Bong Bong where he was a best of Cup runner-up.
"I realised my patience as a breaker didn't help my career in the saddle. I couldn't get them to run," he said.
There were stints at Darley and also with Gary Frazer, working with good horses but by now Vella was always driven to make it.
"Normally breakers never promote themselves, you wouldn't know the best of them would you, but we play such a key role," Vella said. "I just wanted to get my name out there and wanted to be important.
"I work hard at it, my system is three to four weeks but seven days a week, I've got the best facilities to get these horse right before we send them to the trainers.
"But the facilities I have at Hawkesbury being on course, the back tracks, the arena, the access, allow me the best for all my clients."
There has been a training career (34 winners), Blaze The Trail, for Sir Owen perhaps his best performer, a hiatus working for Annabel Neasham, but Vella, while still holding a licence to train and has a handful in work, is too busy with his breaking business looking for that next champion.
"Everything I have done in life and preparation and training I put into my career," he said.
Classique Legend for Bon Ho, and an Everest (2020) is one of those many highlights, but the two-year-olds record is not lost.
"They are the most important, you get them at the start, I'm the first person to touch them to educate them," Vella said.
"Their careers are made in that season.
"Look at Lady Of Camelot, she basically left my system only six months ago, I'd go in and ride Sir Owen's at Gai and Adrian's every Wednesday to keep in touch with them, that's always special."
So, she's another Slipper winner for Vella.
And who's next? We hinted earlier.
He mentions a couple of Segenhoe Stud homebreds that he likes under his early saddle and especially a Bon Ho potential "something" Legend (why not Slipper or is that too much of a mock?)
And can you black book a yearling still at the breakers? And he's not, as he suggests other breakers do at times - bullshitting!
"I reckon there is a very nice horse or two amongst those.
It's a tough job, but I love it and developing the horses as best I can," Vella said.
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