Makybe Diva’s regular jockey, Glen Boss, has reminisced on her final ever race – the 2005 Melbourne Cup.

Having won the 2003 and '04 Melbourne Cup in the previous two years, speculation mounted on whether the Lee Freedman-trained mare would run in the '05 Cup or not, after winning the Group 1 Cox Plate at Moonee Valley.

In fact, Boss revealed that he and Freedman didn’t even know that the star mare was going to run in the Cup until the morning of Derby Day, just three days prior to the race that stops a nation.

“We got there on a Saturday morning (to gallop her for the Cup), and we hadn't made a decision up yet… She just burnt the clock (at the gallop). It was like, ‘My God! How much energy has this horse got?’” Boss exclaimed on SENQ Breakfast with Corey Parker & Ian Healy.

“It was all over, it was just over. Literally all Lee Freedman had to do was to keep her breathing and give her some food.

“She had 58kg (for the Cup), so she was number one, and she was giving weight away to a lot of good horses - for a mare carrying 58kg, it's never been done, this is history-making.”

Fast forward to Melbourne Cup Day, after that gallop on Derby Day, the hoop’s confidence in Makybe Diva was still sky high.

Boss even revealed that once the mare walked into her enclosure, he knew that no other horse stood a chance against the great bay.

“From the time she walked into the enclosure on that first Tuesday, no one stood a chance, it was just going to win,” stated the ex-jockey.

“She’d come into the enclosure like a big, shiny, black Bentley. Her coat was extraordinary, you could tell that her game face was on.

“I remember walking down the roses to go out, and mate, she was just walking down the roses like she was going out there to muster cattle.

“I looked behind me and you've got 120,000 people screaming. The noise is crazy and everything else is losing its s--t behind me, and she's just strutting down there like it's a walk in the park.

“Then you get to realise that that all I had to do is just not disappoint her and we win. Simple as that.”

Makybe Diva went on to win her third consecutive Melbourne Cup, claiming over $14 million in prize money from her career.

After Boss won the race aboard the mare, he iconically took her to the Flemington Clock Tower for the crowd to get one last look at her before she retired – a moment which he dreamed about the night previously.

“Sometimes you have moments in your life, and they rarely happen, that you kind of (already) know the outcome before it's going to happen - you've dreamt about it, you understand this is all going to happen,” explained Boss.

“I dreamt the night before (about) what am I going to do when I win this race… Because it's going to be the last time I'm on her back, and she was such a public figure at this point.

“And I thought, ‘Oh my God, the Clock Tower’.

“Because the Clock Tower is a special piece of real estate on at Flemington, it’s just iconic, and it's where the public are, so I thought, ‘Oh my God, I'm going to take you down there, and I'm going to let the public see her for the last time.’

“I dreamt that the night before.

“So, I took her there (after winning the Melbourne Cup) and I took my hands off the reins and she stood there in front of 120,000 and she just looked from one end to the other.

“You can't script this sh-t, like she just stood there and went like that. For 10 seconds, I felt like a rock star, we both felt like rock stars, it was crazy.

“I'm actually getting goosebumps talking (about this) now, covered in goosebumps.”

Makybe Diva went on to retire as a legend after that third straight Melbourne Cup victory – a remarkable feat that no horse has achieved since.

She unfortunately passed away on February 28, 2026, and leaves us an icon of the sport.