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Mandla Moyo, Sports Reporter
IT is all system go this afternoon at Borrowdale Racecourse when four female horses are loaded to battle for the 2019 edition of the Breeders Fillies Mile listed race.
The event carded as race seven is 1 600m long and has a total prize package of $30 000 courtesy of the Mashonaland Turf Club. From this cake the winner will pocket $18 000 leaving the other placed equines over the line to collect $6 000, $3 750 as well as $2 250 respectively.
Even though all fillies are three years old Lily Blue in lane one ridden by Wes Marwing alongside Wijdaan in lane three with Jennie Greyling on board from the stable of Gokhan Terzi stand out in terms of merit ratings. Both equines rated (77) nine steps higher than the next horse Prescott in lane 2 directed by Calvin Habib who is merit rated (68). The last runner Gimmethegreenback merit rated (65) who will take his mark in lane four with jockey Keanan Steyn also representing the Bridget Stidolph yard.
According to horse racing analyst Sheldene Chant, this could turn out to be an interesting race for many reasons.
“This is an uninteresting race with three of the three horses from one stable, the interesting runner is Terzi’s Wijdaan who has not run at Borrowdale before. However, this runner has raced four times in Gauteng and been placed in last two starts considering that the South African form is stronger than ours so this one could do well, therefore, this is indeed not a race you can say much about,” said Chant.
The fact that her last races have been around a similar distance could work on this horses’ favour. However, when it comes to conditioning a horse for sprint races Stidolph is one such trainer you cannot rule out till it is over. For that reason “once the stall gates open anything can happen,” as the saying goes, any runner from the field can smell the money.
Last year the Breeders Cup was lifted by Mia Finola who is conspicuous by her absence this time around. There are six more races on the card as well as 47 horses fighting for honours in all the races to be held on the day.
Bongani Ndlovu