Yorker wins the 2013 Sansui Summer Cup
A spate of withdrawals threw the Sansui Summer Cup final field calculations wide open late last week. The final field for the 29 November R2 million Gr1 spectacular will be announced on Wednesday 19 November.
Anjaal, Forest Indigo and Ash Cloud were all included on the second Cup log but were withdrawn by trainers Mike de Kock, Alec Laird and Weiho Marwing respectively shortly after the list was produced.
The National Horseracing Authority handicappers, with input from racing operator Phumelela, were then forced to publish an unexpected third log.
Since that log was produced, Sean Tarry withdrew Half The Deficit – the panel’s 10th choice on the list of potential runners, which brought the total withdrawn to 14 of the 56 entries.
Tellina (No 5 on the log), while still officially an entry, would also definitely not be taking part, according to his trainer Geoff Woodruff.
Woodruff enjoyed a terrific Summer Cup last year when his runners finished 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 5th.
Anton Marcus, who is currently sidelined with a thumb injury rode Yorker to beat Master Sabina and win the major share of the stake for owners Bernard Kantor, Markus and Ingrid Jooste and Jim Lewis.
The Woodruff-trained Tellina finished third with the stable’s Killua Castle fifth.
The first 20 on the log were in order of preference while the next 10 are the preferred choices of the handicappers listed in alphabetical order and the remainder were listed in order of merit rating.
The Summer Cup is nearly as old as Johannesburg itself and has a rich and fascinating history.
It was first run in 1887, a year after the dusty mining camp that was to become Johannesburg sprang up on the farm Turffontein following the discovery of gold on the Witwatersrand. The race is run over 2000m.
Watch Tellytrack (Dstv 239) today at 12h08 (part 1) and 12h38 (part 2).
