#John Monash Stakes

You hear plenty of familiar names around the Magic Millions sales grounds. It seems like it was headed by either Gai and Adrian - and you didn't need to add Waterhouse and Bott, or thanks Maher/Eustace when another was knocked down to Ciaron Maher Bloodstock. Annabel, as in Neasham, was on the charts with a bullet. Or then there was "Vinnie", as…

The spacious Flemington racecourse is a mere postage stamp compared to the place trainer Phillip Stokes spent his childhood. Flemington sprawls over more than 140ha of Crown land in Melbourne's mostly cool climate where the worst that can happen is a drenching from a passing shower. Stokes grew up in one of the world's toughest environments, a…