Cosmic Light (Muzi Yeni) powers home to hold Rebel To The Fore (S’manga Khumalo) in a grandstand finish
Maine Chance Farms’ promising first crop sire Querari enchanced his burgeoning reputation when he produced his first stakes winner at Greyville on Saturday. The Duncan Howells trained Cosmic Light built on her fluent debut victory, when, well supported in the betting, she powered home to maintain her unbeaten record in the R200 000 Gr2 The Debutante.
The son of red-hot sire Oasis Dream has been knocking hard with three stakes performers to date in Dynamic Speed, Champery and Spring Wonder , amongst a host of winners – and the inevitable happened when Muzi Yeni pressed the button for Cosmic Light to break the Querari stakes ice in style.
Jockey Anton Marcus was an unhappy man at the start judging by his gesticulations and body language, after Harvest Queen had reared and injured herself, resulting in the Vet giving her her marching orders.
This reduced the field to ten, with the Mike Azzie- trained Frosted Honey fancied at 16-10 to go close after her excellent penultimate run in the SA Fillies Nursery behind Allan Robertson winner, Entisaar.
But the weight of money on her back meant sweet little to the goodlooking daughter of Western Winter, who was never in contention and may well just not be as good as her possible Gr2 flash-in-the-pan suggested.
There was some irony in the Azzie runner being well beaten by a daughter of Querari – the charismatic Gauteng conditioner has been a vocal supporter of the sire and has enjoyed some good success with his progeny.
After Sobonana had led and faded, Lala had looked dangerous, with Khaleesi battling to stake a claim.
KZN champion trainer Duncan Howells – saddled the winner
But it was Cosmic Light who ran on best of all under Muzi Yeni from the worst of the draw to win rather more convincingly than the official half length margin would suggest. Her winning time was 72,29 secs.
Another debut winner caught the eye. Sean Tarry’s Rebel To The Fore ran on well from some way off to take second, 2,25 lengths ahead of the ever-present Lala, who ran a game race.
The Maine Chance Farms bred Cosmic Light is a daughter of Querari out of the once winning Silvano mare, Cosmic Dream.
She is a R200 000 National Yearling Sale graduate and with two wins from two starts took her earnings to R173 750.
She also benefitted from the BSA Added Value Stakes Bonus of R100 000.
Maine Chance have four Querari colts on next month’s National 2yo Sale.
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Gr2 The Debutante (SAf-Gr2)
Greyville, South Africa, July 18, R200k, 1200m, turf, good, 1.12.29
1 – COSMIC LIGHT (SAF), 60.0, b c 2, Querari (GER) – Cosmic Dream (SAF) by Silvano (GER). Owner Mrs H Kuhn & Red Jack Trading (Pty) Ltd; Breeder Maine Chance; trainer DC Howells; jockey M Yeni
2 – Rebel To The Fore (SAF), 60.0, ch f 2, Rebel King (SAF) – Joy To The Fore (SAF) by Pole Position (GB)
3 – Lala (SAF), 60.0, ch f 2, Visionaire (USA) – Hlabelela (SAF) by Muhtafal (USA)
Margins: 0.50, 2.25, 0.25
