Charity starts at home
Relying on charity when riding in a horse race it tantamount to sporting suicide as Anthony Delpech found out to his cost aboard favourite First Crusade in the Coastal Horse Care Unit Maiden at Greyville yesterday. Social media was fired up over the ride, basically accusing Delpech of negligence, but in fairness to the champion jockey it was a case of dammed if you do and damn if you don’t.
Lucky Veil
Arch rival Anton Marcus has a grin all over his chops as he steered Lucky Veil over the line for Ivan and Darrel Moore, more because he has persuaded the grandfather and grandson combination to run the gelding rather than having put one over arch rival Delpech.
“I didn’t want to run the horse from a wide draw,” said Moore the younger post-race, “but Anton persuaded me. He’s a master at what he does.”
However, it may have all turned out differently had Muzi Yeni had let Delpech through a tight gap.
It was there for the taking a furlongand-a-half out but Yeni’s mount rolled out, shutting the door on Delpech who was sitting with the proverbial handful on the favourite. By the time Yeni had switched his stick and rolled back on a straight course, it was a case of race-over for First Crusade who cut the deficit to a neck at the line that came four jumps too soon.
First Crusade
The stipendiary stewards called for a race review but First Crusade was victim of circumstance rather than any wrong doing on the part of Yeni which was how the stipes viewed the incident .
Delpech was booked off after the race and Stuart Randolph took full toll as he steered Gadget Man to a comfortable victory in the Mitras Amenities Handicap for Dean Kannemeyer whose horses have come to hand with a vengeance of late.
Meet The Logans
Meet The Logans looked the best bet on the card and duly obliged with a bloodless victory in the card opener but Liberty Market brought all back to earth as she obliged for Pat Lunn at her 42nd time of asking in what quite frankly was a desperate maiden. Dutch Philip could miss Saturday week’s Selangor Cup after being drawn 14 out of 19 in the Kenilworth Grade 2.
Candice Bass-Robinson said: “I might find something else for him as I am not keen on running him from that draw.”
The July-winning trainer has suggested that the What A Winter colt might prove best in sprints but she said: “He must run in the Cape Guineas (Dec 16) but after that he has the rest of his career ahead of him and he is going to run in the $500 000 CTS 1200 on Met day.” Cape Classic winner Tap O’Noth is a notable absentee from the Selangor entries but Vaughan Marshall previously indicated that he was far from certain to run and his assistant Adele Alsop reported on Saturday that the colt had “pulled up beautifully.”
Brett Crawford confirmed Cape Classic runner-up Undercover Agent a definite runner and Joey Ramsden did the same with Ancestry even though the colt was “slightly sore behind” after his reappearance in a sprint six days ago.
Ramsden has won four of the last six Selangors and added that he would probably also run one of his other four entries. These include the R6 million colt Silver Coin who was reported to be making a noise after his Durbanville reappearance when he tired in the closing stages after moving up promisingly early in the straight.
Ramsden said: “He was blowing hard. He came back in from his holiday a bit later than some of the others because we found a few things wrong that we had to get right. As a result he desperately needed a gallop and more work but I was excited by his run and I loved the way he moved up.”
Eyes Wide Open
Premiers Champion winner Eyes Wide Open has to give 2kg all round in the Selangor and Glen Kotzen reports last year’s winner Gold Standard very much on course for the WSB Green Point on 2 December, saying: “He is going really well and he is in a good place for where I want him to be. Hopefully we will be able to give him a breeze-up on the grass beforehand.”
Miss Frankel makes her eagerly awaited reappearance in the 1 000m Play Soccer Handicap at Kenilworth on Thursday. She looked something special when winning a Scottsville maiden in spectacular style in August. M.J. Byleveld takes over from Anton Marcus.
Justin Snaith has entered last year’s Southern Cross winner Jo’s Bond for the Laisserfaire Stakes at Kenilworth on Saturday but has declared Nordic Breeze, Twinkle Toes and Casual Diamond. Piere Strydom flies down to partner the first-named.
But Ramsden has already ruled out last season’s Cape Fillies Guineas winner Just Sensual, saying: “Not at that weight (64kg). How to stop a good horse from running.”
Bernard Fayd’Herbe rides Winter Series winner African Night Sky and Richard Fourie will be on stable companion Black Arthur in a star-studded Pinnacle whose entries include Edict Of Nantes, Captain America and Last Winter.
Grant van Niekerk, who moved several rungs up the ladder of big-race demand with the way he won Saturday’s Charity Mile on Hat Puntano for Mike Azzie, will sit out the next two Kenilworth meetings with an interference suspension. Winchell Thoroughbreds and Three Chimneys Farm’s Gun Runner went to the front shortly after the break and never trailed as he defeated Collected to win the 34th running of the $6 million Breeders’ Cup Classic (Gr.1) for 3-year-olds to close the first Breeders’ Cup World Championships at Del Mar racetrack before a crowd of 37,692. Defending champion and favoured Arrogate finished in a dead heat for fifth in his bid to join Tiznow as the only back-to-back winner of the Classic. Trained by Steve Asmussen and ridden by Florent Geroux, Gun Runner is a 4-year-old Kentucky-bred son of Candy Ride.
It is the sixth Breeders’ Cup victory for Asmussen and second in the Classic, having prevailed 10 years ago at Monmouth Park with Curlin. It is the fourth Breeders’ Cup victory for Geroux and first in the Classic.
It was the fifth victory in six starts in 2017 for Gun Runner and fourth Grade 1 triumph. It also avenged his lone defeat to Arrogate, who had prevailed in the Dubai World Cup in March. Legendary Irish trainer Willie Mullins is subscribing to the theory that ‘age is just a number’ as he prepares to launch a threepronged attack in this morning’s Emirates Melbourne Cup (6am on Tellytrack DStv 239).
It’s a remarkable feat for any trainer to have three horses in Australia’s greatest race, let alone a trio of well-travelled raiders that would ordinarily be given ‘veteran’ status down under.
Wicklow Brave is the equal oldest horse in the Cup this year alongside Who Shot Thebarman at nine years of age, while Thomas Hobson and Max Dynamite join defending champion Almandin as the eight-year-olds lining up.
But while some punters may look at their veteran status as a hurdle to their chances of victory – no nine-year-old has ever won the Cup while the last eight-year-old to claim victory was Catalogue in 1938 - travelling foreman David Casey said the three gallopers were a credit to Mullins’ training style and the selective manner in which the horses have been campaigned during their respective careers.
“The way we campaign our horses probably has something to do with that,” Casey said.
“We’re hard enough on them but we don’t just run them, we pick their races throughout the season and we stick to that.
“Because of that, the horses tend to last a little bit longer and they are fresh towards the end of the season.” Racing.com