Race that stops a nation resonates deeply with Willie Mullins

As the pre-eminent National Hunt trainer of his time, and having landed almost everything worth winning over timber and birch, it perhaps shouldn't come as too much of a surprise that the prize Willie Mullins covets most for his trophy cabinet at Closutton is the Melbourne Cup.

Mullins secured another accolade on Sunday when he was named Manager of the Year at the RTÉ Sports Awards, with former stable jockey Ruby Walsh presenting the honour.

An annus mirabilis for Ireland's perennial champion trainer culminated in him becoming the first Irish-based jumps trainer since Vincent O'Brien in the 1953-54 season to be crowned the leading handler across the Irish Sea.

Winning a second Grand National at Aintree went a long way to achieving that feat, as did saddling nine winners at the Cheltenham Festival, where Mullins became the first trainer to saddle 100 winners at the meeting.

One race that didn't go to plan in a stellar year, was the Melbourne Cup, with a twin-pronged assault on 'the race that stops a nation' resulting in a fifth-place finish for Absurde and Vauban coming home six places further back.

Sojourns Down Under in early November have become a staple in the Mullins calendar. A number of his runners have been in the shake-up, without getting their heads in front, and Max Dynamite went agonisingly close in 2015 and 2017 when finishing second and third.

The pain of loss hurts more than the joy derived from victory. It's how humans are hardwired. For Mullins, the near-misses fuel his future ambitions.

"We've been second, third, fourth and fifth in the Melbourne Cup," he told RTÉ Sport. "That's a target we're going to try again next year and the year after.

"Even though we're predominantly jump racing, we always have a