Piere Strydom keeps Brutal Force at it to beat Zambezi River (Bay Media)
There is just no stopping Joey Ramsden and his top owners Ingrid and Markus Jooste and the combination were to the fore in yet another Cape feature after a glorious summer. The unfinished script somehow has Investec Cape Derby and the star Act Of War pencilled in for next Saturday’s final chapter.
Jooste bid a new South African record for a horse sold at auction when going to R4,5m for Brutal Force, at the CTS Ready To Run Sale at Durbanville in 2013. He had originally purchased Brutal Force at the Cape Premier Yearling Sale for R1,5m and outbid Mike Azzie patron Adriaan Van Vuuren to set his record, after ‘valuing’ Brutal Force at R5 million, for purposes of the buy-back strategy.
The previous record was the R4m bid by the late Graham Beck for Divine Jet at the 2010 National Yearling Sales in Germiston.
Joey Ramsden – just can’t do anything wrong at the moment
On Thursday this past week, the Jooste record was shattered and a new bar was set in the Cape Premier Yearling Sale first session when a Maine Chance Farms bred Dynasty colt was knocked down to a new owner for R5,2 million.
But the handsome hulk of Brutal Force forced himself back into the news on Saturday with a top drawer performance.
In a thrilling finish, Piere Strydom threw the kitchen sink at the chestnut after S’manga Khumalo had extracted what looked like a winning burst in the charge for home out of the CTS RTR Stakes winner, Zambezi River.
The Tarry Trippi colt had actually passed Brutal Force down the outside inside the 100m but Strydom had shrewdly kept one breath in reserve and the Ramsden runner came right back for a decisive push at the line.
He got the decision by a short head in a time of 69,16 secs.
Seen this before? Piere Strydom and Joey Ramsden with the Jooste team on the podium (Bay Media)
It was a superb effort by Zambezi River, a notoriously slow starter, who had to make his way from an unfavourable outside draw with a strong tail wind not aiding his cause at all.
Another Jooste runner, and the first filly home, Charles Laird’s Beloved Country ran on into third, while Dom Zaki-trained Precursor grabbed fourth.
Sean Tarry had some token compensation for the narrow defeat of Zambezi River with his Toreador filly Spanish Dawn banking the last of the stakes with R15 000 paid for her tenth placed finish.
Brutal Force has now won 2 of his 6 starts for 3 places with a stakes haul of R966 625.
The Lammerskraal Stud product is by Western Winter out of the four-time winning Pas De Quoi mare, Nacarat. A prolific winning family!
As a big backward horse, Brutal Force looks to be an exciting prospect in the making and can only get better as he matures.
