Beach Beauty - Horse Of The Year
THE KZN Breeders Awards were held on Saturday night at their now annual venue of Bellwood Cottages in the Midlands breeding region and the much-loved mare Beach Beauty received the final accolade of her racing career by being named Horse Of The Year.
Chairman of KZN Breeders Koos de Klerk admitted that the panel had “slipped up’’ in previous seasons by not including the brilliant Dennis Driertrained Dynasty mare in the awards. Clifton Stud owner Peter Blythe then pointed out that, although Beach Beauty had been born in the Cape, her dam was a permanent resident on the late breeder Trevor Armitage's farm near Volksrust in KZN and Beach Beauty was also raised on the farm. Beach Beauty’s dam Sun Coast had travelled to the Cape to be covered by Dynasty and after giving birth down there travelled with her foal back to the Armitage farm.
Armitage had never registered his horses with the KZN Breeders clubs partly due to his aversion to paper work, but also because he felt it would be wrong, having accepted breeders premiums on his previous farm at Standerton in Gauteng, to accept the same from Gold Circle. Sun Coast was also honoured and named Broodmare of the Year.
Beach Beauty is in foal to Duke Of Marmalade at her new home of Drakenstein Stud. Sun Coast is now retired to Sandown Stud in Paarl, which is owned by Trevor’s nephew James Armitage, as she has a physical problem preventing her from breeding.
Trevor’s widow Minou spoke at the awards and described the “incredible journey’’ Beach Beauty had taken them on before paying tribute to her late husband and also to her late son Mark, in whose honour the Shanks Syndicate for whom she raced was formed.
She described Trevor as a gentle giant, who had all the attributes necessary for the tough industry of thoroughbred breeding, including “a lot of patience and a sense of humour." She recounted the story of a phone call Trevor had received from a prospective buyer of Beach Beauty and after the figure was offered he replied, “Are you talking pounds sterling or dollars?’’ When this was greeted by a silence followed by “Rands’’, he responded, “How many of her tail hairs do you want?’’
Beach Beauty also received the Outstanding Older Female and Outstanding Middle Distance Female awards.
There were two dual award winners on the night, Futura and Wild One. Futura is a Brett Crawford-trained colt, also by the sire Dynasty, and was named Outstanding threeyear-old colt and Outstanding Middle Distance Male. He was bred by Guy Murdoch and Mike Jolly. He had an unusual path as he was conceived at Gary Player Stud in Colesberg, born at Yellow Star Stud in the KZN Midlands where he was raised until he and his dam relocated to Mauritzfontein Stud in Kimberly due to Murdoch accepting a position as stud manager. Wild One is a Scott Brothers-bred Mogok gelding and was named Outstanding Older Male and Outstanding Stayer.
One of the biggest cheers of the evening was at the announcement of the Breeding Achievement Of The Year award, which went to the popular Rodney Clarkin, whose small operation produced the Outstanding Threeyear-old filly award winner, the Lucky Houdalakis-trained Gr 3-winning Kahal filly Sarasota.
It was matched by the cheer for the Special Lifetime Achievement Award winner, the doyen of KZN Breeders, George Rowles, who has also contributed to other aspects of racing. He was honoured by two life long friends Robin Scott and Bill Lambert. Lambert delivered an entertaining and humorous speech.
Martin Locke proved to be an eloquent substitute for the usual Master Of Ceremonies Graeme Hawkins, who was away at a function in Johannesburg.