Brett Crawford saddled the 2016 Gr1 Cape Flying Championship winner Gulf Storm. The gelding was bred by Ascot Stud from their late high-class stallion Sail From Seattle.
Greg Cheyne poses for the photographer as Pacific Trader powers home (Pic – Chase Liebenberg Photography)
At the final Cape racemeeting of 2018, held at a sun drenched Kenilworth on Saturday, Crawford introduced another decent looking sprint prospect into his powerful attack in the shape of the progressive Pacific Trader, who demonstrated an impressive display of raw speed to beat a quality Pinnacle Stakes field.
Like Gulf Storm, Pacific Trader is a son of Sail From Seattle and was also bred by Ascot Stud.
A 1000m specialist, Pacific Trader was ridden by Ridgemont Highlands jockey Greg Cheyne and beat a line up that included Gr1 winners Bold Respect, Sergeant Hardy, Attenborough and Sand And Sea, as well as recent Gr2 Merchants winner Kasimir, and Gr2 scorers Search Party and Trip To Heaven – the latter surely one of the best horses yet to win a Gr1,
Pacific Trader stormed clear to hold off the attention of Richard Fourie on Kasimir by two lengths in a time of 57,78 secs.
Crawford stabled a double on the day.
The winner’s stablemates Bold Respect and Search Party – coincidentally also Ascot breds – were back in third and fourth respectively.
Brett Crawford (far left) leads the happy lead in (Pic – Chase Liebenberg Photography)
Pacific Trader, a R150 000 2016 CTS Emperors Palace Select Yearling Sale graduate, is out of Agbalat (Cape Cross), an unraced daughter of Irish Gr2 2000 winner Tarshi.
He has won 4 races with 3 places from 9 starts for stakes of R292 313.
While he still has some way to go to match strides with the big guns at weight-for-age in the R1 million Cape Flying Championship, Pacific Trader’s name is bound to be on the list when entries for the 1000m feature close at 11h00 on Wednesday 2 January.
