Redberry Lane shows her class
THE Sean Tarry-trained Redberry Lane provided Lammerskraal Stud with their first Grade 1 winner since Pieter and Jolanda Graaf purchased the farm from former owner Mike Rattray in 2014 when winning the Grade 1 Jonsson Workwear Garden Province Stakes at the Vodacom Durban July meeting on Saturday.
Lammerskraal’s great USA-bred champion stallion Western Winter is locked in a posthumous battle with Jet Master for the title of most prolific producer of individual Grade 1 winners in South African history and he moved into the lead again as Redberry Lane provided him with a 23rd .
Jourdan
Lammerskraal’s stalwart stud manager Sally Jourdan shared the Graaf ’s excitement, particularly as Redberry Lane is yet another success story in a burgeoning Lammerskraal-owned family which is full of class.
Tarry believed the front-running filly’s best chance of beating the brilliant Justin Snaith-trained Captain Al Filly Snowdance was to “gallop her into the ground” so his hopes were dampened when she was unable to get to the front due to the good starts by both Snowdance and Folk Dance inside of her.
However, she settled well on the rail behind a keen Snowdance as Final Judgement set a steady pace out in front. It panned out well for Redberry Lane from there. She was able to take the shortest way home on the rail. Meanwhile, Snowdance was carried out in the straight while overtaking the pacemaker and she then hung inward in the latter stages. Champion Jockey elect Lyle Hewitson extracted a late surge from Redberry Lane to get up on the head bob and secure his second career Grade 1 victory.
Snowdance
Snowdance’s defeat was a body blow to the Snaith team, who felt for the punters. As a result they were unable to elevate the meeting to their best ever day in racing, despite having earlier landed the Vodacom Durban July one-two-three as well as fifth place.
Ironically Redberry Lane is a full-sister to the Snaith-trained Grade 1 Cape Guineas and Grade 2 KRA Guineas winner Solo Traveller, who was born in 2007.
Solo Traveller was bred by Lammerskraal Stud and was the first male progeny of broodmare Strawberry Lane. The latter won third time out over 1600m and at stud is fast-becoming a matriarch. Besides the two Grade 1 winners she has produced, her first foal Strawberry Ice, also by Western Winter and born in 2006, was four-times Graded placed and at stud she has produced Flying Ice (Go Deputy), who won the Grade 2 Gold Bracelet and a Listed race and is set to make her USA debut for Barry Irwin’s Team Valor in the late Fall. Strawberry Ice has also produced five-time winner Varsity Cup (Var), twotime winner Rampant Ice (Go Deputy) and a recent winner Strawberry Fire (Silvano) from all her foals. She has a two-year-old Dynasty colt on the ground who will be trained by Singapore-based Pat Shaw. She has another Dynasty colt at foot too.
Strawberry Lane also has a Dynasty two-year-old colt on the ground and is currently in foal to Visionaire, who stands at Lammerskraal.
Redberry Lane and Solo Traveller have three other full-sisters as well as a fullbrother, the four-time winner Starret City.
Rockaberry Lane
The three full-sisters are three-time winner Rockaberry Lane, three-time winner Strawberry Line and one-time winner Skylar Lane.
Strawberry Line has a Duke Of Marmalade two-year-old filly, a Wylie Hall yearling filly and an Act Of War weanling colt on the ground and is now owned by Summerhill Stud.
Rockaberry Lane has “a magnificent Querari filly” on the ground and is in foal to Var.
Skylar Lane has a Querari filly with the Snaiths and is in foal to Visionaire.
Strawberry Lane’s ascendants are becoming sort after and she is gaining a reputation as big as one of Lammerskraal’s other best matriarchs, Nacarat, from whom the like of Grade 1 winners Nania and Red Ray hail.
Lammerskraal’s other stallion Go Deputy, sire of Triple Crown hero Abashiri, continues to produce, despite being unfashionable.
His progeny are also doing well in the Lammerskraal colours at present. Jourdan was asked by Graaf to pick two of Go Deputy’s fillies out of his 2014 crop and she plumped for Flichity By Farr and Insignis.
Flichity By Farr
The Alyson Wright-trained Flichity By Farr finished a flying second in the Grade 3 Gold Vase on VDJ day and should be a big runner in the Gold Cup. Insignis is doing well for Geoff Woodruff and finished fourth to Redberry Lane in the Listed Syringa Handicap.
The Stud has always been associated with red and white silks so when Rattray took his colours with him the Graaf ’s together with Jourdan designed a set of silks using the same red and white colours.Nick Jonsson, who part-owns the July one-two Do It Again and Made To Conquer, was on the podium to congratulate Redberry Lane’s connections as the CEO of Garden Province Stakes' sponsor Jonsson Workwear.