There has been talk of Equus Horse Of The Year Captain’s Ransom running in next year’s L’Ormarins Queen’s Plate, which will settle the debate about superiority between her and her Justin Snaith-trained stablemate Jet Dark.
However, if she avoids the boys and attempts to retain her Grade 1 Cartier Paddock Stakes crown instead, there will be just as epic a clash.
The Sean Tarry-trained Equus Three-year-old Champion Rain In Holland is Paddock Stakes bound and the Andre Nel-trained Chansonette, a narrow runner up to Captain’s Ransom last year, is also likely to line up.
Rain In Holland was in line for Equus Horse Of The Year before she was found to have an entrapped epiglottis, which saw her being scratched from the Hollywoodbets Durban July.
In this condition, the rim of the soft palate that normally lies under the epiglottis folds around the epiglottis like a glove.
Epiglottic entrapment is corrected surgically by opening the fold that covers the epiglottis.
Surgical transection is generally curative, with a relapse rate of only 5%.
Tarry said about the Wilgerbosdrift Triple Tiara heooine, “She is back in full work and has been moving well and looking good.”
She will run on WSB Summer Cup day, although he is not sure yet whether it will be in the big one or the Grade 2 Ipi Tombe Challenge for fillies and mares. He is also not sure whether her springboard into Summer Cup day will be a Pinnacle event or the Jo’burg Spring Fillies and Mares Challenge on October 1.
However, her chief target is the Paddock Stakes.
He believed Grade 1 Allan Robertson winner Sweet Pepper had been unlucky not to win the Equus Champion Two-year-old award, being the highest rated two-year-old in the country on 115.
He said her last run in the Grade 2 Zulu Kingdom Explorer Golden Slipper could be ignored as she had travelled a bit too hard and had pulled up lame. He is not sure of her route for the season yet.
However, his other crack young filly from last season, the narrow Grade 1 Thekwini Stakes runner up Rock The Fox, will be aimed at the Johannesburg fillies classic events.
He is excited about Grade 1 Gold Medallion winner Thunderstruck and said, “he is a fine prospect and I don’t believe he will be limited to sprints. The Cape Guineas will be considered with him.”
He is hoping older horses Litigation and Platinum Sky can “step up to the plate” this season.
He said his two stakes-winning filly sprinters, Sound Of Warning and Full Velocity had both been doing well and expected good seasons for them.
He concluded by saying he had done well with Drakenstein Stud’s homebred horses last season, sending out four individual stakes winners for them, and he hoped this successful partnership would continue.
