Imagine you’re a rival of Usain Bolt in an athletics final. You’re on the blocks, the starter gun goes off and away you go. At halfway there are people waving their arms to stop. You do and are told: “Sorry, Usain wasn’t ready – you’ll have to return to the start.” That – in a nutshell – describes the fiasco of the false start in Saturday’s L’Ormarins Queen’s Plate at Kenilworth with Anton Marcus playing the role of Usain, writes David Mollett.
Of course, the end result of Variety Club winning the massively-hyped Gr 1 race went down well with the majority of punters. Not, understandably, with the bookies who were inundated with bets on the favourite when it was clear he hadn’t jumped with the field.
Of all the comments on what transpired, the most accurate came from Pomodoro’s trainer, Sean Tarry. When I interviewed at Turffontein on Sunday, he said: “We were all there to have a fair race and didn’t get it.’
Sean added: “Racing can’t afford this type of incident – the person (at the start) wasn’t doing his job.”
Presenters love to say “take nothing away from the winner” which in racingeze means “the horse has won, but it might have turned out differently if things had gone better for others in the race.”
Variety Club certainly found more in the finish as the pack began to close, but my advice is to only back him for the J&B Met with the “non-runner no bet” clause.
I spoke to Markus Jooste’s racing manager, Derek Brugman, yesterday and he clarified the current situation: “We are keen to campaign Variety Club overseas over his right distance. We have contacted Dubai to apply pressure from a South African perspective to shorten the quarantine period.”
“As of today (Tuesday morning), we’ve had no reply from them and – if there is no communication by Friday – on the request for special dispensation then Dubai becomes a one-in-a-million chance,” said Derek.
“By winning the Queen’s Plate, Variety Club gets an automatic invitation to the Breeders Cup Mile Turf and – subject to doing well there – he could move on to Hong Kong for the mile race there in December.”
“We will be asking the Americans to relax the 60-day quarantine there where they’re stuck in a stable – it’s demoralising on the horses. He could do well there especially as many of his opponents will have had tough European campaigns.”
Derek was quick to stress that “nothing is official yet but – if Dubai falls through – he could still be here for the Met. We will know more later in the week.”
Anton Marcus will definitely be the man in the saddle on any overseas campaign but – if Saturday is any indication – the journos there shouldn’t hold their breath about getting much newsworthy information from him.
Derek describes Anton as “a politican of note” and he’s got that right. At the prize-giving, Neil Andrews asked “what on earth happened down at the start?”
Back came the reply: “A big thank-you to the sponsors, thanks to Markus (Jooste) for his commitment and Joey (Ramsden) has really done a tremendous job.”
Nothing about the start – just more gushing and racing fans had to put up with more than their fair share of that up to – and including – Monday morning! The presentation ceremony went on for so long that the next race had to be delayed by five minutes. That didn’t happen when Frankel bowed out of racing at Ascot in October.
Not returning to the start issue, Neil went on to say that he considered Variety Club “exceptional and good enough to carry the SA flag overseas.” Amen to that and – if he does as well as one of SA’s best exports the Marcus-partnered Jay Peg – then it will be a huge fillip for our breeding industry.
The false start wasn’t the only thing to go wrong on Saturday – the wrong placings (with Pomodoro second) went up on the monitors. Tellytrack in-studio presenter, Nico K, described it as a “huge blunder.” Jackson eventually got the photo-finish verdict over Pomodoro and the exacta – always a good bet in big feature races – paid over R10.
Jackson turned in another honest effort and remains favourite for the J&B Met. However, it was Pomodoro’s performance that was particularly pleasing considering his long road haul from Gauteng.
Chris van Niekerk’s champ is still in the quarantine zone at Kenilworth and it should just be a case of keeping him ticking over for the next 17 days. At least punters know that there’s no chance of him being pulled out of the Met.
Beach Beauty’s put her own sex to bed with the minimum of fuss in the Maine Chance Paddock Stakes and – in the process – won plenty of friends for the Met. It’s another feather in the cap for Dennis Ralph Drier who has excelled in his profession since being granted his licence way back in 1978.
It was good to see John Bescoby involved in the Beach Beauty ownership – the former Gold Circle chairman was resplendent in yellow – perhaps blue isn’t his favourite colour! It’s sad that a man of his intelligence and integrity isn’t now involved in racing other than ownership – the continual bickering and back-biting resulting in him opting out.
The performance of fourth-placed Martial Eagle in the Queen’s Plate surprised most pundits and he’s thrown his hat in the ring. Nevertheless, of the longshots, I still like Master Plan (currently 25-1) to run in the first four.
This, of course, produced plenty of ridicule from “Bloodshot Bruce” down at Lance Michael’s at Brightwater Commons where one of the regulars, “Scotland-the-Brave Dave”, felt Bruce’s broken ribs might have affected his brain. As Variety Club was being led in, Bruce quipped: “Good job they’ve retired Frankel.”
– Dave Mollett in Racing Express
