After late money was plunged on the locally trained five-year-old gelding, Alcopop went in the $5.5 million race a $4.80 favourite, just in front of Bart Cummings’ 2008 winner Viewed.

“The run wasn’t too bad, I was pretty happy with it,” part owner and trainer Jake Stephens told The Times on Tuesday night.

Alcopop loomed a danger halfway down the straight before running out of steam in the race’s final stages.

“It was just one of those things in racing, you got to keep them up at the end but he was at his peak for a while there,” Stephens said.

The Alcopop team will now reflect on the horse’s first Cup quest, with an intention to bring home the Cup in 2010.

“We will sit down now and look at the run and watch it over the next couple of days and take it from there,” Stephens said.

It was a bitter sweet result for all concerned after Alcopop dominated the field, which included Shocking, in the group two Herbert Power Stakes on October 10.

“We are still on a learning curve here in the training game, we will be better for the experience.”

Stephens thought highly of the run by the Mark Kavenagh trained winner, Shocking.

“Shocking’s improvement since we beat him in the Herbert Power is impressive.”

“Watching his last run last Saturday, we knew that Shocking was going to be up there, he was always going to be our main threat, and he won it.

Stephens said that Alcopop will now have “a big long rest” that he “fully deserves”.

“We will give him a good spell now, a big rest now ready for his next preparation,” Stephens said.

Questions raised before Tuesday’s Cup run over the inexperience of Alcopop, jockey Dom Tournuer and the connections were blown away early on Tuesday morning when they arrived at Flemington.

“Yeah that was no worries at all, I think I handled it well, obviously there was a bit more of a crowd there but it wasn’t too bad,” Stephens said.