| Ready-To-Run Gallops: Still Time For A Tilt |
It’s getting tight, but if you’re a candidate with a ticket in a race this week, you’ve still got a shot at lining up for the Emperor’s Palace Ready To Run Cup. In the past week alone, three more put up their hands, and the field doesn’t close till the fat lady sings. It’s a regular refrain of trainers after an indifferent ride, to label jockeys “illiterate”, but the one thing they aren’t, is innumerate. Put R3 million bucks on the line, as Phumelela does for the “Cup”, and there’s pandemonium.
The problem is, there are just eighteen slots for the big day (sixteen runners and two reserves), and this year competition is as intense as ever, with any one of the top 36 in the merit ratings in with a shout on exposed form. Of course, it’s conceivable that a big performance from a first-timer this week, could leapfrog him right into contention as well, so the door is by no means shut.
Spare a thought for the selection panel for a moment. Big prizes attract big entries, and big controversy is inevitably the bedfellow. While there’s always plenty of ecstasy among those that get over the line, there’s a measure of agony too, for the “near-misses”. The mandate of the panel though, is plain enough. “Choose the best field to compete on turf on the standside track at Turffontein over 1400metres on the first Saturday in November”, nothing more, nothing less.
No matter your merit rating, if you look like a sand specialist, a 1000 metre horse or an-out-and-out -stayer, you’re risking elimination, not that’s its necessarily fatal, but it can put an amber light next to your name, in the absence of compelling evidence of these credentials.
It’s an old adage of the Sale and a race now patronised by Her Serene Highness Princess Charlene of Monaco, that “there’s a horse for everyone at the Ready To Run”. This was best illustrated in the line-up for last year’s Cup, when almost 50% of the field cost R100 000 or less. There’s a slightly more “elitist” feel to this year’s top entries, with a strong element of the R200 000 + purchases (19) among the leading contenders.
Which puts a bit of dampener on the conjecture in the press recently that none of last year’s “millionaires” are currently in contention, though it’s also true that only a handful have been to the races, and both have shown glimpses of future potential. Times like these remind us that just a few renewals ago, the first two home, Hollywoodboulevard and Igugu, cost almost R2million between them, and in that particular year, they were the only two in the betting. That said, as long as you have hope, you’ve got a chance, and 10 of this bunch either made R100 000 or less, or were unsold.
“Big” movers this past week included perennial Ready To Run “champion,” Alesh Naidoo’s Nisa’s Love, who obliterated what looked like a competitive field at Turffontein, to take her from 25th in the rankings to 7th. While this week’s log has yet to be published, there were two more sparkling performances at Turffontein Saturday before the rain came down from Shout Out (by Mullins Bay) who franked the form of another claimant, Rainy Day, with a 4.5 length destruction of a field jammed with form, followed by Flight Check’s 2.75 length demolition of an aspiring bunch of stayers over 2600 metres.
The daughter of A.P.Arrow’s “sin” may of course, be the distance, but that’s a matter for the selection panel: certainly, the victory was impressive enough.
The “thin red line” on the 18 mark appears to be hovering around the 84/85 merit rating, and traditionalists will tell you that a rating of 85 has long been held as the passport for Stakes-class horses. Scroll down to number 36, and you’ll find a shoal of aspirants in this category. Numerically Charles Laird appears to have the boldest hand, with Admirals Eye, Pej and Nisa’s Love, though he’s matched for numbers by Mike de Kock, Gavin Van Zyl, Geoff Woodruff and Michael Azzie, with Sean Tarry and Weiho Marwing breathing down their necks.
A fresh face among them is the former Woodruff assistant, Johan Janse Van Vuuren, who has hopes for the highly regarded Winter Star and first-timer, Casha.
Among consignors, the champion breeders, Summerhill hold the strongest hand with 23 of the top 36 (65%) while demographically, fillies dominate the colts with 21 (60%) against 15.
On the stallion front, the much-lamented loss of Stronghold is evident in his 7 candidates, while Kahal (5), Mullins Bay (4), Admire Main (3) and Solskjaer (3 in the top 16) explain the hand Summerhill has been dealt.
As for the imports, the presence among this year’s race “finalists” of the progeny of celebrated international stallions Rock Of Gibraltar (2), Encosta Da Lago, Dylan Thomas and Danehill Dancer, is mirrored by their representation in the sales entries.