Mission accomplished. Or, as Neil Armstrong famously said all those years ago, “the Eagle has landed.” Prepared from way back for a tilt at the J&B Met, Pocket Power came through with flying colours to land the Cape’s premier race at Kenilworth on Saturday. His road to the Met may have been at times a somewhat controversial one, with pundits asking questions about the riding tactics employed on him in some of his lead-up races, but it all came together at a sun-drenched Kenilworth on the last weekend in January, writes Matthew Lips.
There are some great trainers in SA, including of course those who have so successfully carried the flag abroad, but when it comes to prepping a horse for a big race Mike Bass is right up with the absolute best of them. When it comes to the now-concluded Cape summer season for 2006/07, he towered above all others, winning half of the eight Gr1 races on offer.
Because it is a conditions race where weights are allocated according to a formula based on previous Graded races won, the J&B Met demands – perhaps even more than any other major race in out calendar – a well-planned preparation. Pocket Power’s effectively began after he became in 2006 the first horse ever to win all three legs of the Cape Winter Challenge series for 3yos. Rested for more than 3 months after completing that sweep, he was given three runs over 1200m (none of which he won) before the prestigious Gr1 Queen’s Plate over 1600m, which he did win. That came after the Met weights were finalised, and to many punters any Queen’s Plate winner carrying 53kg in the Met must be a “fair” thing. The fact that he only won the Queen’;s Plate by a short head from Silver Mist and opposed that rival on identical weight terms in the Met didn’t stop Pocket Power from starting as a heavily supported 16/10 favourite to become the first horse since Yard-Arm three years ago to complete the big Kenilworth double.
There would be drama before the Met. The field had all but finished loading into the gates when 6yo mare Badger’s Gift barged through the front of her stall, dislodged jockey MJ Byleveld, and bolted the course riderless. This was a cruel blow given her facile start-to-finish win in the Gr1 Paddock S a few weeks earlier, but there was no way that she could take part in the Met after galloping the full 2000m back to the parade ring. More than twenty minutes passed before Byleveld was stabilised by the medical team at the start and stretchered off the course, but although concussed he escaped with no broken bones. The remaining fourteen horses seemed to take the delay in their stride and continued to ring happily behind the gates, but over in the grandstands nerves must have been stretched to an almost unbearable point.
Even without Badger’s Gift this was always likely to be a Met run at a true pace and it was sole KZN raider Pinero who set a sound tempo from the start, showing the way about a length or so ahead of Lion Tamer. Elusive Fort and Majestic Sun were next in line, with Jagged Ice not far behind them but caught a little deep. Jeff Lloyd had Pocket Power racing about eight lengths off the pace in about midfield with Silver Mist also thereabouts. Hilgrove, as always, was waited with well off the action.
Pinero made a bold attempt to pinch the Met and skipped three lengths clear at the top of the straight, trying to make full use of the well-established fact that his nearest pursuer Lion Tamer is a relentless galloper but one without a noticeable ability to change gears. Piere Strydom’s mount was still comfortably clear halfway down the straight as Lion Tamer stayed on remorselessly behind him, but more than 200m out the pacemaker was clearly in trouble. Wider out on the track it was Pocket Power who was patently coming home best of them all. This guy certainly can change gears, and once asked for an effort he skated past rivals without too much fuss, getting to Pinero just inside the last 200m and kicking for home.
Lion Tamer chased the favourite all the way to the line, but once again he was found out by a rival with a better turn of foot, and he was beaten 1.25 lengths into 2nd despite the winner shifting in quite markedly over the closing stages. (A race review was called into this incident, but no further action was taken, and rightly so.) Lion Tamer can now add a second in the Met to his third in the Gommagomma Summer Cup and 4th in the Vodacom Durban July. He deserves a decent win, but that lack of a knockout punch will always leave him vulnerable.
African Appeal, a stable companion to the winner, ran the race of his life and was running on steadily to finish third ahead of Succesful Bidder, who had been nicely positioned throughout and who looked to have every chance in a race which (unlike its 2006 counterpart) appeared to produce few hard luck stories of any real merit. A decent pace no doubt had much to do with that.
Silver Mist disappointingly ran nowhere near the form of his terrific Queen’s Plate effort and never looked like featuring. Likeithot was never a factor, and nor was sole 3yo Emperor Napoleon, whose bold bid to follow in the footsteps of his Met-winning sophomore stable companions Horse Chestnut and Badger’s Coast never looked like bearing fruit. Okay, so he should have run in the Derby instead, but that’s 20/20 hindsight for you and Mike de Kock didn’t get to where he is by simply doing everything according to somebody else’s book.
The stable companions Eyeofthetiger and Jagged Ice never got into it. The former had it all to do at the weights anyway, for it takes one hell of a horse to land the Met carrying a Gr1 winner’s penalty. The last July winner to go on to success in the Met was London News a decade ago; the last one before him was… who knows, his name is buried so deep in the archives you need dynamite to dig it out. Politician, probably. Jagged Ice looked to have every chance, but was never in a position to credit Karl Neisius with a much sought after first Met win on the veteran Cape jockey’s 50th birthday. That only works in the movies.
Elusive Fort had been well backed during the week, but it took an enormous leap of faith to expect a horse to win the Met that had not run for 16 weeks and who had only raced once since the July. He’s a hugely talented horse, and Geoff Woodruff is a masterful trainer, but this really was expecting miracles. Look at the preparation the winner had and try and compare the two. Talk about apples and oranges!
To be honest, as the race unfolded, precious few horses ever looked like winning the 2007 J&B Met. Once Pinero folded, it was all Pocket Power. He became the second Met winner for Mike Bass, who saddled the “exacts” of Bunter Barlow and Trademark in 2001, and the fifth for Jeff Lloyd, who had previously won with Wolf Power, Divine Master, Surfing Home and, twelve months ago, Zebra Crossing. Pocket Power is co-owned by Marsh Shirtliff (whose colours have been as prominent this Cape summer season as Table Mountain) and Mr and Mrs Alan Webber.
Pocket Power is a son of sire sensation Jet Master out of the Prince Florimund mare Stormvlei, who at various times has been sold for R10.000 and R12.000 on assorted broodmare sales, most recently when Pocket Power was a weanling. It can be a lovely game, this. Four-year-old Pocket Power was bred by Dan de Wet at Zandvliet and was bought for R190.000 at the ’04 Cape Summer Yearling Sale. He has now won 7 from 14, earning R1.958.525. He has already won a major WFA event, so there is no reason whatsoever why he cannot carry on to more significant victories. The KZN winter season presumably beckons – after a nice, well-earned rest, naturally.
