Kevan Rice and his wife lead in The Gliding Fish after the Mark Dixon-trained gelding had won at Hollywoodbets Scottsville in March (Candiese Lenferna Photography) 

Kevan Rice is a part-owner in the Flying The Flag gelding The Gliding Fish among other Mark Dixon-trained horses.

The latter horse had to be scratched at the start on Wednesday in an incident that was most unfair to both him and his connections.

He had sat quietly in the stalls for more than two minutes, but then became intimidated by an unruly horse next to him.

The latter had been given at least a half-a-dozen chances to load despite continual fractious behaviour.

The Gliding Fish injured himself as a result of the intimidation.

Read about the incident here: https://www.turftalk.co.za/how-many-chances-should-starter-give-fractious-horses/?fbclid=IwAR0c1CnSe2llPtK_Yezauq4hBn5iStNDD5JUDcFJmRV5VSyHWtfzTee-Y7Y

Rice gave his views on starting stall procedures in South Africa.

He also provided his own recommendations on how it could be improved.

He said, What I find amazing in this country is that despite the racing industry having gone through such a deterioration, and kudos to Greg Bortz and Hollywooddbets and others who are trying to do their best to do whatever they can, the basics are still not entrenched or followed.

Our horse had a really good chance of winning on Wednesday, but that’s not the point. 

The point was it was two minutes and 6 seconds he had been in the starting stalls waiting for the number two drawn horse to load.

I had recorded the race and I came back and timed it. 

In between that time the horse in stall 9 was getting frustrated.

The veternarian was correct to scratch our horse because he had torn the skin off his hindleg. 

But I asked the vet ‘What are the rules when it comes to starting?’ 

He replied, ‘It is discretionary.’ 

I said, ‘Discretionary to who?’ 

My thoughts are the following: Is discretionary when you are in a good mood or a bad mood? Is discretionary when there is a favourite when you are trying to load or not a favourite? Where is the borderline and who decides whether it is within the bounds or out the bounds if there are no bounds? 

I think it is so poor for racing. 

I can accept for juveniles, who have not had an opportunity to race much, so they are skittish at the start and so give them leniency … absolutely, without question. 

But four, five, six-year-olds who have raced many times before, where do you draw the line? 

My thoughts after this incident was you’ve got to penalise somebody, because the punters are losing. 

To have two horses scratched in only a nine horse race because it takes more than two minutes to load nine horses??? 

Either the starters and handlers are that poor or the horses or that bad, it’s somewhere in between there. 

What if it was your P6 or Jackpot banker that gets scratched and the favourite doesn’t come in. 

That penalises punters and they are scared of that. 

I’m not a big punter and I’ve only been a racehorse owner and breeder for the last four or five years, but I look at the amount of money I’ve personally invested buying horses, breeding horses and then seeing stakes money being reduced by 20%. 

And today (after the starting stall incident) I questioned, having bought three horses at the last KZN Sale for Mark Dixon, whom I rate as a top trainer, ‘Why am I doing this?’ 

I just think what they should do getting back to the starting system is, you can’t just say ok two minutes to load. What if you’ve got three bad horses, that could be six minutes of loading and what about the horses that are standing in the stalls for that long? 

It is just not right. 

They’ve got to have some sort of rule. 

The Gliding Fish was initially not a good loader and I have this belief that what is fair for one is fair for everybody. There were times when I thought “scratch Fish” because he’s making it uncomfortable for the other horses. 

Because I love horses, and obviously we have more love for our own horses, but our love is the horses and you can’t penalise others by saying ‘Oh just allow my horse time to load just because he’s our horse – it’s wrong’.  

Number 2 was unruly and my question is why allow a bully to continue to be a bully at the expense of everybody else. 

The horse is difficult to load so give him lots of treatment at the gates and give him lots of training, let him get used to it. 

So my suggestion is you allow ex number of seconds or ex number of attempts for a horse and you then scratch him or her.

There could also be a system whereby a trainer gets a black tick for a difficult loader and then if repeating over a certain  period, he or she could then be taken to task for not doing enough gate training. 

But for me as a small owner supporting a small yard like Mark Dixon, Wednesday’s incident was just not right. 

Peter Muscutt, who trained the unruly horse, in fact actually came and apologised to Mark Dixon and myself. It was obviously not his call to give it so many attempts to load. The starter should be brought to task. 

We love our horses and it is routine for my wife and I to go to Summerveld to visit our horses and feed the whole barn carrots, we love it.

So this is not about winning this is just about applying consistent rules that will make it better for everybody. 

If one had the time to research, one could see how many times it happens, as it appears to happen often around the country. 

The question is why is it allowed to happen when there is no consistent rule applied to how you load and what the consequences of not loading smoothly are? 

Trainer Alson Ndzilana (left) with groom Siphumelele Tshaka after Famous Lady’s victory on debut (Picture: 4 Racing)

Fledgeling trainer Alson Ndzilana has loved horses from his childhood days and his natural affinity with them helped him become an astute trainer as did his many years of experience learniing from two masters, Joey Ramsden and Mike de Kock.

His early results show that for those who want success with their racehorse purchases he is a man to support.

He notched up the notable achievement of winning with his first ever two-year-old runner on Tueday.

That saw his overall statistics improving to two wins from just 16 runs for a strike rate of 12,50%.

In the process this first-timer called Famous Lady made it one win from one start for freshman stallion Talk Of The Town.

Very few trainers win with two-year-olds first time out.

Furthermore, Alson only has a small string of ten horses so would not have had much opportunity to try her before the race.

However, he obviously gave Famous Lady a very good preparation.

She pinged the pens and came out rolling and she then ran straight and showed no signs of being green.

With very little to work with he got her in to the winner’s enclosure, which is a tremendous feat.

Any trainer will tell you it is very difficult to win with first-timers, especially two-year-olds.

Stables who do win with them usually gallop them quite a few times.

A trainer who wants to win with one on debut will have to get the youngster fit and running straight at a time when they are still growing.

James Goodman, an ex-trainer of vast experience, has been lending a hand at the Ndzilana yard and confirmed, “To arrive at the racecourse with a two-year-old first-timer and have her tuned up and without any niggles is tremendously difficult. This filly had only gone through the pens twice, yet he had her pinging the gates. He has also only had her since July, while most trainers get their two-year-olds anywhere from January to April. To win with this two-year-old shows how good a trainer he is. Alson has a lot going for him, but is just getting no support.”

James added, “Pippa Mickelburgh comented very positively on Alson while he was with Joey Ramsden as he always used to provide the information about the horses she required.”

Mickelburgh, the stud manager of Avontuur Thoroughbred Farms, would have been thrilled with Famous Lady’s victory because Avontuur stands Talk Of The Town.

Famous Lady’s victory was also an important one for breeding in South Africa considering the lack of sprinting stallions.

Talk Of The Town is by Avontuur’s stalwart stallion Var, who was European Champion Sprinter.

Bred by Kilimanjaro Bloodstock, Famous Lady is out of the High Chaparral mare Lady Val.

She hails from the first crop of Talk Of The Town, who won three of just five starts in a brief racing career.

Talk Of The Town shares his sire Var with a host of high-class performers including champions Variety Club, Val De Ra, Via Africa (dam of Australian G1 winner In The Congo), Vardy and Anything Goes.

The chestnut Talk Of The Town hails from an outstanding female line, with his relatives including not only such successful South African sires such as Northern Guest and Pathfork, but legendary Australian stallion Redoute’s Choice as well.

This is also the family of Desert Lightning, who won the Gr1 TAB Classic at Trentham last Saturday.

Desert Lightning, a grandson of Street Cry, is bred on similar lines to Talk Of The Town’s dam Street Wise, with the latter herself a daughter of Street Cry.

Tail Of The Comet winning the Cape Racing Sales The Ready To Run Stakes (Picture: Wayne Marks)  

Keagen de Melo scores his tenth win on the island (Picture: HKJC)

Graduates of the South African Jockey Academy (SAJA) won four of the nine races at Happy Valley in Kong yesterday and nearly made it five when Lyle Hewitson went close in the last.

Keagan de Melo reached double figures in the island, his tenth win, when scoring on the Caspar Fownes-trained New Zealand-bred Tivaci gelding Super Contented in the second race, a class 5 event over 1650m.

The horse, paying 11.00 on the Tote, showed a good turn of foot from a position just backward of midfield in a 12 horse field to win by a neck.

Luke Ferraris scored in the fourth race, a class 4 handicap over 1200m, on the Cody Mo-trained Australian-bred Eurozone gelding Togepi.

He extracted a flying finish from the back of the field and they got up by ahort-head paying 13.00 on the Tote.

Ferarris is now in 7th place on the log with 13 wins for the season, one ahead of Hewitson.

Mautitian-born SAJA graduate Karis Teetan scored a double, including one for another SAJA graduate who now trains, Douglas Whyte.

Teetan is on 26 wins for the season and is in 2nd place on the log, 13 wins behind leader Zac Purton.

Whyte had had 17 wins and is in 5th place on the trainers log.

Seconditis: the record-holder who was runner-up 34 times – and the current star who could take his ‘crown’

Paul Fielder (Racing Post)

The gallant runner-up. Seconditis. At the end of the day something has got to finish second, but some are better at it than others.

Counting only races in Britain, Dvinsky is the daddy of them all. Under numerous trainers, the son of Stravinsky managed to finish runner-up on 34 occasions, including 13 times on Kempton’s all-weather track. He admittedly had more opportunity than most to finish second, having run 231 times in his career, and reached a peak official rating of 90.

Most of the others in the top ten of combined Flat and jumps runner-up finishers in Britain have long since retired, although the 13-year-old Indian Affair (27) called it a day only last year, and the 11-year-old Red Stripes (26) last ran in January and looks unlikely to add to his tally given he has run 30 times since his most recent second-place finish.

Indian Affair represented Milton Bradley for most of his career and the late trainer was also responsible for The Tatling, who managed 28 second-place finishes, 24 of which came in Britain.

But there is an active contender who could yet give Dvinsky a run for his money. John Betjeman has an impressive record of 21 runner-up finishes from 57 starts (a strike-rate, of sorts, of 36 per cent) on the Flat and over jumps, and is still only a seven-year-old.

The well-named son of Poet’s Voice started his career as he meant to go on by finishing second in a 5f conditions race at Bath in 2018, when trained by Bill Turner, and has managed a further six runner-ups on the Flat.

Now trained by Mark Gillard, who gave him his first start over hurdles, John Betjeman finished second on his jumps debut at Fontwell in 2019 and has gone on to record a further 13 runner-up finishes over the smaller obstacles, including in four out of five starts at Wincanton. He has an identical record on the Flat at Salisbury, while the trainer’s son Fergus has been particularly unlucky having finished second ten times from 19 rides on the gelding.

John Betjeman has won three times, all over jumps, and has run into one too good for him in five of his last nine outings. Assuming he has another five or six years of staying sound, there is every chance he can move up the list – he is operating at close to his best BHA rating over jumps – or even usurp Dvinsky.

The Corrie Lensley-trained Erupt filly Happy Analia gave Muzi Yeni his hattrick today (Picture: 4Racing)

Muzi Yeni landed a treble at the Vaal Classic track today and Sean Tarry landed a double.

Yeni is now on 89 wins for the season, 20 behind Richard Fourie, and he has done it at a strike rate of 15.01%.

Tarry is now on 24 wins at 10.76%.

The late Malaysian businessman Dato’ Tan Chin Nam was the first Asian to win the Melbourne Cup and he was  joined by Godolphin in 2018 by Sheikh Mohammed Obaid al Maktoum this year.

Dato’ in fact won the Melbourne Cup four times – with Viewed (2008), Saintly (1996) and Think Big (1975 and 1974).

Malaysia’s first Prime Minister, Tuanku Abdul Rahman was a part-owner of Think Big when it won the 1975 Melbourne Cup.

Dato’ is one of three owners to have won the Cup four times.

However, they are only joint second in the record books behind Lloyd Williams, who has won it seven times  (1981, 1985, 2007, 2012, 2016, 2017, 2020)