Three time Melbourne Cup runner up and Australian crowd favourite Red Cadeaux has been euthanised.
Racing Victoria released a statement on Saturday morning expressing sincere regret that the Ed Dunlop trained stayer had died following injuries sustained in the the cup earlier this month.
"It is with great sadness that Racing Victoria (RV) advises that Red Cadeaux has today succumbed to complications from the injury he sustained in the Emirates Melbourne Cup at Flemington on 3 November 2015," the statement read.
Red Cadeaux is the third horse to die after the last two runnings of the Melbourne Cup after favourite Admire Rakti and Araldo lost their lives last year.
Admire Rakti staggered past the finish line and suffered a heart attack in his stall while Araldo took fright a flag-waving racegoer when returning to the Flemington mounting yard and got his leg caught in a fence.
But their popularity paled into comparison to that of Red Cadeaux. He developed a cult following in Australia as a three-time runner-up in the country's greatest race, including his first trip in 2011 when beaten a "pixel" by France's Dunaden.
He would later return to run second behind Fiorente (2013) and Protectionist (2014) before this year's trip brought about a record fifth Melbourne Cup appearance as a 10-year-old by southern hemisphere standards.
But the chestnut wouldn't finish the race after breaking down in the Flemington straight as his Hong Kong-based rider Gerald Mosse returned to the Flemington jockeys' room in tears.
He was rushed to Werribee Vet Clinic where the prognosis was positive after he underwent surgery 24 hours after the Melbourne Cup.
The horse, which finished his career with more then $8 million in prize money, was touted to spend his retirement at the Living Legends complex on the outskirts of Melbourne.
His death is likely to spark further debate about restrictions on older racehorses after Racing Australia earlier this year made it mandatory for horses to retire at the end of their 12-year-old season.
Dunlop and his travelling foreman Robin Trevor-Jones dismissed suggestions the horse wasn't fit to start in the Melbourne Cup and painstaking tried to nurse him back to health.
