17 Derby Day Magic Sporting journalist Bruce Walkley has written a whole, affectionate book about Drongo, giving the definitive account of how the horse got his name. The original reference was not unkind. The drongo shrike bird is found in the north and east of the continent. It has glossy black plumage with iridescent blue-green spangles, a long forked tail and blood red eyes. It is of the genus Lanius – the name of the sire of thoroughbred Drongo. At his final two career starts, in 1925, Drongo finished fourth in the Adelaide Cup and then second in a classy handicap at Adelaide’s Victoria Park – beaten a neck. Sam Wells, cartoonist with the Melbourne Herald, was one of the first to lampoon the horse who could never win. The name made its way into Australian vernacular. A slow footballer in 1934 was ‘a drongo’. The expression morphed into ‘a bit of a dill’, and worse. By 1940, a poem in Air Force News described a hapless airman: ‘He was just a —— drongo, although he did his best. He was just a drongo, a bit behind the rest.’ Bobbie Lewis had ridden seven Victoria Derby winners before he rode Drongo in the 1923 race. Afterwards he described him as the unluckiest Derby colt ever beaten. 100 TO WON: 100-1 outsider Rebel Raider gave Clare Lindop her first Group 1 win, becoming the first female to win the Derby in its 150-plus year history. (Mark Dadswell/Getty Images) (Quinn Rooney/Getty Images)
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