Story byFILE - Jockey Glen Boss rides Makybe Diva across the line to win Australia's richest horse race the A$4.6 million (US $3.2 million) Melbourne Cup Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2003. (AP Photo/Mark Baker, File) (ASSOCIATED PRESS)Associated PressSat, February 28, 2026 at 5:49 AM UTC·1 min readMELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — British-born Australian champion race horse Makybe Diva, who won the Melbourne Cup three times between 2003 and 2005, has died. Owner Tony Santic said in a statement Saturday that the mare who amassed 14 million Australian dollars ($10 million) in prize money, died at the age of 26 after a brief bout of colic at her retirement stable near Geelong outside Melbourne. AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementSantic, a Croatian-born tuna fisherman from South Australia state, named the horse after the first two letters of his employees’ names — Maureen, Kylie, Belinda, Diane and Vanessa.“From the day she came into our lives, she was never just a race horse, she was family," Santic said in the statement.
