Grand Runs Forecast For Crawford Duo

Jack Milner (4Racing)

The World Sports Betting Grand Heritage over 1475m at the Vaal on Saturday is really a unique event in South African racing.

This R500,000 Non-Black Type affair is the only race in the country that contains more than 20 runners and is run over a distinctive distance.

With a full field of 28 runners the Grand Heritage cavalry charge looks as competitive as always, but James Crawford believes the stable’s two runners on Saturday both have excellent chances. James, 23, who runs the satellite yard on the Highveld for father Brett, will saddle Irish Tractor and Gallic Tribe.

Gallic Tribe is currently quoted at 16-1 and Crawford believes that price is good value. “He’s a horse who has his little niggles. He can sweat up a bit at track and more so with racing, but he’s been a different horse on the Highveld.

“He won his debut run comfortably, without pressure. Last time, when he finished fourth, he raced three wide up the hill at Turffontein so I wouldn’t look at his last start as any indication of his true ability.

“He is a natural front-running galloper, he will be up with the speed and I believe he will run a cracker. He has to be respected and with 53kg on his back I expect him to be in the first four,” said Crawford.

There is, however, perhaps a slight preference for Irish Tractor, who finished a five-length sixth in the Grade 2 Allied Steelrode Onamission Charity Mile at Turffontein last time from draw No 15 of 16 runners.

“If he had a draw, I think he wins the race,” said Crawford. “I haven’t had him in a better race. He likes the fight, likes it when he has a horse who keeps challenging him.

“His final gallop going into the race was top class and when Kabelo (Matsunyane) was given the option of the two he took Irish Tractor without hesitation.

“But while I probably prefer him of the two the fact Irish Tractor gives 5.5kg to Gallic Tribe perhaps levels the playing field a little.”

Irish Tractor is currently quoted at 8-1.

Worth Backing Two Horses In The Annual Grand Heritage Stampede

Dyce and Irish Tractor are worth a punt in the Vaal race on Saturday

Thoroughly! A Fascinating Tale Of A Racing Legend

Alec Hogg, founder of Moneyweb and Biznews, was a good friend of Ormond Ferraris and wrote the introduction to Ferraris’s recently published autobiography ‘Thoroughly! Seven decades in the sport of Kings & Clowns’ written in collaboration with Charl Pretorius.

As Hogg alludes to in his introduction carried below, this is a book that belongs on the bookshelf of everyone even remotely interested in thoroughbred horseracing.

The arrival of my pre-publication copy of Thoroughly sparked a degree of trepidation.

For four decades, reading has been at the core of my personal and professional existence. Far too many books, probably 90% of those published, are a waste of time. This worthless quotient rises still further with autobiographies – the author’s own life story.

More than a few relationships have been destroyed by honest feedback to authors. And as Ormond Ferraris would expect nothing less that brutal honesty, I feared the worst.

Overlay this with the subject being a very private man, one who has always counted his words before releasing them. And this project was unlikely material for a page-turner.

I need not have worried.

With the expert assistance of talented wordsmith Charl Pretorius, the end-product is a gem. From how to pick a yearling through to Distinctly’s July, from the reason he was forced to abandon the Cape to why he tossed it all in, there is much to savour.

Admitted, I struggled to do so, racing through the pages like a Ferraris runner at the business end of the Oaks. Then again, the real judge of any book is the number of times it is revisited. Which in my case will be many.

Thoroughly opens a long-closed window to extraordinary life. For those of us who know and love the man, it is classic Ormond Ferraris, offered without apology or embellishment. Because that’s his way. He has always told it as he sees it. Most often correctly.

There is much in the pages which follow that paints an accurate picture of this unparalleled horseman whose love for the thoroughbred, whose principles and integrity, will live long after he has left us.

His track record proves him to have been an excellent judge of horseflesh, among the best to set foot in one of SA’s sales rings. Not as evident, though, is an unerring ability to judge human beings.

Bear that in mind as you absorb the stories and insights that follow. To illustrate, indulge me with one of my own stories.

For years, whether joining his first string for pre-dawn work, a coffee in his Turffontein office or on memorable trips to breeding farms, Ormond and I fenced over differing opinions about the SA racing industry’s dominant owner, Steinhoff CEO Markus Jooste.

Ormond derogatively referred to the man as “Joostie”, dismissing propaganda that claimed he was the country’s most successful business-builder. To him, the celebrated entrepreneur was purely and simply “a rubbish”. A man he had seen to be without without honour. One who pursued his own narrow interests and to hell with the way it affected the horses.

He remained deeply suspicious of Jooste’s acclaimed business prowess which transformed his small company into a global giant – and its CEO into the dominant South African owner and house guest at the most prestigious racing establishments, including Ireland’s fabled Coolmore.

Ormond wasn’t swayed in this conviction, even though the world’s biggest banks, the most respected investment analysts, the clutch of accounting experts on Steinhoff’s directorate and even Big Four auditor firm Deloitte publicly backed the billionaire.

At his peak, such was Jooste’s grip on SA racing that pretty much every trainer had a set of black green and gold silks hanging in their cupboards. These well known colours almost made it into the Turffontein mancave. But not quite.

After much nagging from my side, Ormond eventually relented and agreed to train a horse for him, provided I race it in partnership with Jooste.

When the poor beast arrived, its chosen trainer was apoplectic, sending the float straight back to where it came from. The incident gets a brief mention in this book.

The story which hasn’t been told is how Ormond saw the arrival of this “deformed” animal as confirmation of everything he believed about “Joostie”. In the months and years since, he spared no opportunity of reminding me of it. Repeating his warning that this man was not to be trusted.

It was an unerringly accurate insight, as the rest of humanity only discovered much later when, in December 2017, Jooste was unmasked as the engineer of South Africa’s biggest ever corporate fraud. A con job that cost investors hundreds of billions of rand.

Then again, in a long and colourful career, Ormond knows better than most that racing is an enterprise which has always attracted society’s princes and knaves. The best and the worst of humanity.

Determining who fits where, is not always easy. Once again, OA Ferraris is an exception. For anyone who has met the man, there can be no doubt into which category he falls. Ever.