Gold Challenge
SA’s top race
The Hollywoodbets Gold Challenge at Greyville in Durban was rated the top horse race in South Africa – and 35th in the world – in the recent Longines World Racing Awards.
Rainbow Bridge won the 2020 running of the Gold Challenge, a 1 600m Grade 1 race for all horses on weight-for-age terms and one of the highlights of the KwaZulu-Natal winter feature season.
Rainbow Bridge went on to win the 2021 Sun Met, a contest that was rated the joint second-best in SA by Longines in collaboration with the International Federation of Horseracing Authorities (IFHA).
The 2020 Sun Met tied as the 38th top race worldwide with fellow Kenilworth Grade 1, the L’Ormarins Queen’s Plate.
The Longines/IFHA rank the world’s 100 top horses, jockeys and races annually.
The top race in the world in 2020 was the Juddmonte International Stakes over 2 080m in York in the UK. Second was the Irish Champion Stakes at Leopardstown and third the Japan Cup in Tokyo.
The US gained fourth spot with its Breeders’ Cup Turf, raced in 2020 at Keeneland in Kentucky.
Tied for fourth was another Japanese race, the Tenno Sho in Tokyo.
The top 100 ranking contained more than a few surprises. The Prix de la Arc de Triomphe at Paris Longchamp, said by many to be the best race in Europe, could manage no better than 11th in the world, while the prestigious Kentucky Derby and Hong Kong Cup were tied in 16th place.
The first Australian event on the list was Flemington’s Darley Sprint Classic in 21st. The UK’s venerable Epsom Derby has plummeted in estimation – to 93rd.
In the SA order of merit, after the Gold Challenge, the Met and the Queen’s Plate came another Greyville race, the WSB Champions Cup (51st in the world).
The Vodacom Durban July – universally regarded as the top race in the country – placed only fifth locally and 58th in the world.
The only other SA race in the top 100 was the HF Oppenheimer Horse Chestnut Stakes at Joburg’s Turffontein racecourse – joint 93rd with the Epsom Derby.
The top horse was Gaiyyath, an Irish-bred colt owned by Godolphin and trained at Newmarket, England, by Charlie Appleby.
The top jockey, announced some months earlier, was 50-yearold Frankie Dettori.
Do It Again, third to Rainbow Bridge in the Gold Challenge, was ranked the top horse in SA and 34th in the world.
Hawaam was second (40th) and Rainbow Bridge, One World and Vardy third (joint 57th) – way ahead of Summer Pudding (107th), Belgarion and Got The Greenlight (joint 141st).
The awards were announced at the end of January, but the rankings did not include points from any 2021 events. For the full rankings see