Roberts may do it again
• Will Do It Again fulfil jockey great’s new quest?
Michael Roberts’ career as a jockey had numerous highs, but he has found the going tougher as a trainer and is still searching for a grade 1 champion.
Roberts, rode his first winner in 1968 at the tender age of 14 and won 17 SA championships before relocating for a 17-year spell in the UK. There, he rode with great success — he won the King George and Queen Elizabeth Stakes on Mtoto — and the crowning glory was capturing the UK jockeys’ title in 1992. He was only the sixth non-British rider to win the championship.
This term, Roberts’ search for a top horse may finally have been realised as See It Again —a three-parts brother to Do It Again — has looked smart in his four outings. A son of Twice Over owned by Nic Jonnson, See It Again has moved into second place for the WSB R7.5m Gold Rush race to be run on Met day next year.
The Cape horse, Dave The King, tops the log with 105 points with See It Again and Time For Orchids on 104. Next in the table are Far Away Winter (102) and Lord William (100). Champion Warrior remains on 94 after failing to run a place at Kenilworth last Saturday.
Roberts has played a huge part in the emergence of female jockey Rachel Venniker, who is ninth in this season’s national log. She was engaged to ride six horses for trainer Justin Snaith at Kenilworth last Saturday.
Venniker partnered Hawk Circle — a R500,000 son of Silvano — into third place in the third race and the three-yearold won’t be in the maiden ranks for long. On Sunday, at Greyville came the latest chapter in the Roberts-Venniker success story with SA racing’s No 1 lady piloting Pongola to victory in the final race. The three-year-old is a son of Ideal World and races in the colours of Jet Dark’s co-owner Tommy Crowe.
Rain permitting, the Vaal will host an eight-race Work Riders meeting on Tuesday and Ashley Fortune’s three-year-old, Prime Example, provides punters with a banker bet in the fourth race.
Fortune booked experienced work rider Sam Mosia to partner the son of Canford Cliffs who is overdue to leave the maiden ranks. The gelding’s chief rival could be Joe Gwingwizha’s mount, Ballycotton.
Gwingwizha has a ride in all eight races and his second-best mount looks to be Sean Tarry’s three-year-old, Future Pearl, in the sixth race. This son of Futura cost Anthony Beck R525,000 as a yearling and the gelding should take this 1,700m contest en route to better things.
Tarry and Gwingwizha also team up with a fancied runner in the final leg of the Pick Six in which National Star will be tough to beat if ready to roll after a 20-week break. There are four first-timers in the race and the pick could be Fabian Habib’s daughter of Gimmethegreenlight, Royalgreenlight.