The lessons learnt from the track and weather issues of 2018 have seen the R500 000 Grand Heritage now carded for 2 December at the Vaal.

Last year the Grand Heritage Series 1 and 2 were run after delays on 20 October at Turffontein and were won by Soldier On and Tsitsikamma Forest.

The race was originally scheduled to be run as the WSB Grand Heritage over 1475m at the Vaal on 29 September in which an enlarged field was due to square off against one another.

The course was not in good enough condition an

d the race was postponed for a couple of weeks.

Unfortunately, the course was still not up to scratch so the decision was taken to move the race to Turffontein. But that course did not have the facility to have all the horses compete in one race so the decision was made to split the race in two and have the winners face one another in a Grand Series final.

Trainer Stuart Pettigrew was annoyed that the Grand Heritage Match Race had been scheduled for the straight course over 1475m at the Vaal rather than Turffontein and Solider On did not participate.

Paul Matchett’s Dan The Lad eventually beat Tsitsikamma Dance in the winner-take-all R250 000 WSB Grand Series Match Race at the Vaal last December.