admin
Takudzwa Chitsiga-Sports Reporter
IT will be that time of the year again at Borrowdale Park and racecourse when runners converge for the prestigious Ipi Tombi race tomorrow.
Each year Zimbabwe’s racing fraternity honours Borrowdale Park’s most illustrious graduate with the running of the Ipi Tombi Stakes over 1 600 metres and this year MWORS has partnered Mashonaland Turf Club for the race.
MWORS Ipi Tombi has US$2 500 in stakes and a total of six runners have confirmed their availability.
The star-studded line up has seasoned athletes’ in What a Dandy, Buggati Blue, Lily Blue, Wantage, Holly Land, and Mr Greenlight.
The great racing filly, Ipi Tombi, was born in 1998 at Peter J Moor’s Golden Acres Farm in Marondera. She was sold to the Sunmark Racing Syndicate for $50 000 on the TBA Premier National Yearling Sales in 2000.
Ipi Tombi by Manshood was one of the most influential sires worldwide and his dam, Indian Skimmer, was the champion filly in Europe.
While racing at Borrowdale Park, Ipi Tombi was trained by Noelene Peech and won four of her five starts and was always ridden by Dewi Williams
Ipi Tombi then moved to Mike De Kock and made her South African debut in March 2002, finishing second at Turffontein. Ipi Tombi never lost another race, going on to win South African Fillies Classic (Gr1), the South African Fillies Guineas (Gr1), the Woolavington Stakes (Gr2) and the 2002 July Handicap (Gr1).
Ridden by Kevin Shea, Ipi Tombi won from a number 18 draw in the “July Handicap”, her driving finish made her the first three-year-old filly to win the race in 50 years.
Team Valor then entered the picture and Ipi Tombi campaigned in Dubai, winning three races including the Haafhd Jebel Handicap (Gr 2) and the Dubai Duty Free Stakes (Gr1) – performances that earned her the 2003 Dubai Horse of the Year award.
After relocating to the United States of America, she won her only start in the Locust Grove Handicap (Gr3) on June 28, 2003, the only Zimbabwe-bred horse to win at the historic Churchill Downs track.
Soon afterwards Ipi Tombi retired to the stud due to an injury, with an impressive record of 12 wins and two seconds from 14 starts, and earnings of US$1 529 799.
Every year the 1 600 metre Ipi Tombi Stakes is run at Borrowdale Park and organised by the Mashonaland Owners and Trainers Association.
Online Reporter