(Click here for the Japanese chart and race information, which includes a link to the video of the Japan Cup.)

Already the richest filly or mare in Japanese racing history with career earnings over one billion yen, Vodka captured the mile and one-half Japan Cup in her third attempt, bettering her fourth-place finish in 2007 and a third-place effort in 2008. She covered the distance in 2:22.40, the third-fastest time in the 29 runnings of the Japan Cup. The victory was the 15th for a Japanese-trained horse, tipping the sales in the home team’s favor for the first time. Fourteen renewals have been won by international horses. Japanese horses have won the last four runnings and 10 of the last 12.

The win was the 10th in 25 starts for Vodka, a 5-year-old daughter of Tanino Gimlet out of Tanino Sister, by Rousillon. She was the 2008 Horse of the Year in Japan and stands a good chance to repeat this year. The Japan Cup win comes less than a month after unbeaten Zenyatta’s come-from- behind victory over males in the Breeders’ Cup Classic, which vaulted her into a contentious battle with the 3-year-old filly Rachel Alexandra for American Horse of the Year honors. It has been quite for fillies all around the globe.

Unfortunately, Vodka came out of the Japan Cup bleeding in the nostrils and will be unable to race for at least  30 days, according to Japan Racing Association regulations. That will preclude her from racing in the season-ending Arima Kinen, which could determine Horse of the Year. Her connections did not say whether or not she would be retired.

Christophe Lemaire rode Vodka for trainer Katsuhiko Sumii (pictured, left), replacing Yutaka Take, who had been the filly’s regular rider. In a rare display of displeasure with the Japanese racing legend,Take faced public criticism for his most recent rides aboard Vodka. Sumii said the decision to replace Take was his. Owner Yuzo Tanimizu said the stable wanted a jockey that had "no previous knowledge of her wanting to go early" in her races. She had been somewhat rank and eager under Take, but relaxed beautifully into fourth position in the early stages of the Japan Cup for Lemaire.

Take was aboard Reach the Crown, who set the fractions in this year’s Cup but faded in the stretch and wound up ninth. 

Oken Bruce Lee, fifth in last year’s Japan Cup, was flying on the outside at the finish, and it took several minutes for placing judges to post Vodka’s No. 5 as the winner. The margin was said to be only two centimeters.

"Oken Bruce Lee finished so fast and was in front after the winning post, so I had some doubts whether I’d won," Lemaire said. "I could hear the crowd shouting, and even when something is happening behind you, you feel when someone is coming."

Lemaire (pictured, right) said he was surprised when he got the call to replace Take. "The most important thing they wanted me to do was get her to relax," he said. "French jockeys may be used to riding keen horses due to the style of our racing. Maybe that’s why they wanted me.

"The filly was very quiet and calm. The pace of the race was good enough. She wanted to go in the last corner, but I tried to keep her energy for the last 200 meters." The tactic played out perfectly as Vodka had just enough left to get the nod.

Conduit’s jockey, Ryan Moore, said he did not get off to as good a start as he’d liked, but appeared to get a good trip thereafter, but may have had too much ground to make up from his bad early start. "There was not much time between his last race and today, so maybe he got a little tired," Moore said.

A trio of American horses was led by Just as Well, who finished seventh. Interpatation wound up in a dead-heat for 14th and Marsh Side 17th. No American-trained horse has won the Japan Cup since Golden Pheasant in  1991.