Silvano homebred filly Silver Sanctuary gave both Mike de Kock and Drakenstein Stud another Gr 1 victory respectively in last year’s Woolavington 2000. (Candiese Lenferna)
The Woolavington 2000 is going to continue being open to older females despite it having lost its Gr 1 status.
However, there are going to be some tweaks to the conditions of the now Gr 2 race.
Justin Vermaak said, “It will become a conditions race of sorts with some reprieve for lesser types.”
The Woolavington failed to meet the APC benchmarks for Gr 1 on three consecutive occasions when it was a level weights race restricted to three-year-old fillies.
However, in order to not downgrade it immediately an appeal was made to the APC whereby the conditions of the race were to be changed.
The conditions of the race were therefore changed into a weight for age event for fillies and mares of all ages and the Gr 1 status remained.
However, it failed to meet the APC benchmarks for a Gr 1 in a further two renewals.
In the last two renewals of the Woolavington, when it was run as a weight for age race for fillies and mares, none of the first four finishers on either occasion managed to subsequently improve on their best performance of the season.
So, the Woolavington 2000 has now failed to reach the benchmark level for a Gr 1 race in five successive runnings.
However, like the Gr 2 Golden Horse Sprint, it might now become a more appealing race for punters, with a number of runners being capable of winning it.
