Few P6 pickings

EASIEST PICK 6 TO CATCH WAS AT KENILWORTH Seattle Singer was the longest-priced winner at Turffontein on Saturday.

There were Pick 6 carryovers to every race meeting in South Africa over the weekend and some of the boosted pools provided joyous celebrations toa few shrewd players. There were big payouts at Greyville on Friday night and at Turffontein on Saturday.

With a R200,000 carryover to last Friday’s meeting at Fairview, the pool reached R781,386. There were a couple of surprises, including Queen Justine in the last leg, and just 0.04 percent of the pool was won. Only R27,689 of the pool was paid out with the rest carried forward.

Longest-priced winner was debutante Precious Pansy in the East Cape Fillies Nursery. She opened at 35-1 before drifting to 40-1 and then 50-1 and beat 13-1 shot Widow’s Lamp.

Results at Greyville that night were not that bad for punters with three favourites winning, all in Pick 6 legs. However, at the end of the night only 17.64 winning Pick 6 tickets remained with the bet yielding a dividend of R74,589.

Biggest villain of the piece was arguably Figaro, who was a popular banker in Race 5 over 1600m. He was coming back from at 77day rest, but was ranked well clear on merit ratings. Trainer Dean Kannemeyer and jockey Anthony Delpech had to settle for second with Figaro behind Paul Laffertytrained Notacademicatall, who came into the race having been beaten a total of 47.55 lengths in his four runs to date.

Notacademicatall led from the start and although Figaro loomed up menacingly alongside about 400m out and pressured 1.5kg claimer Diego De Gouveia and the long-time leader throughout the closing stages, the 13-1 shot showed courage and stuck to his guns to win by a head.

Champions Day at Turffontein on Saturday 6 May brings the curtain down on the Highveld Autumn Feature Race Season and the official trials for the races to be run then were held at Turffontein on Saturday.

There were clues aplenty to be collected from the trials, but they will be better assessed after Classic Day next weekend.

The Pick 6 pool at Saturday’s Turffontein meeting was boosted by a R600,000 carryover with the pool swelling to R2,914,796. Winning the bet was not that easy though and it paid a healthy R98,938 to 29.46 tickets.

Biggest upset was Seattle Singer (28-1) in the Sycamore Sprint over 1160m. However, that race had an open look about it and players with good memories would probably have not discarded the Corne Spies-trained runner, who less than a year ago finished second in the Gold Medallion at Scottsville.

Even the runner-up finish of Starpath (16-10) in the final race should not have been the end of the world because the favourite was beaten by a debutant in Glider Pilot.

Trainer Tyrone Zackey’s runner looks one to follow. He was backed from 40-1 to 10-1 and, although not drawn that well at No 10, won a good race.

The favourites did get beaten in two of the legs including Bull Valley (12-10), who could only finish fourth behind Champagne Haze in the Senor Santa Stakes.

Deo Juvente and French Navy disputed favouritism in the Colorado King Stakes but Brazuca followed up on a good win in his previous start and put them both in their place, winning by more than three lengths. It was an ultrapromising preparatory run for the Premier’s Champions Challenge.

Kenilworth was by far the easiest meeting for punters with five favourites winning and the R1,116,987 pool paying R2,340.