Pine Princess strikes in the King’s Pact Stakes to make it two from two (Gold Circle)
Bred by Highlands from a Klawerveli stallion and owned by Maine Chance Farms. Throw in Mike De Kock and the winner of Sunday’s R120 000 King’s Pact Stakes run over 1000m at Clairwood could be considered pretty well connected.
Captain Al’s daughter Pine Princess probably shouldn’t really be winning races over the minimum trip either, as she is out of a Badger Land mare and doesn’t have too much natural pace. But she downed her four opponents, including her highly vaunted and beautifully bred imported stablemate, Shahrasal, in a solid display of power galloping.
Stable jockey Anthomy Delpech’s choice of mount indicated the stable elect and the dogs were barking about the grey Australian bred Shahrasal, who went off a 17 to 10 favourite against the 5 to 2 available about Pine Princess.
Spanish Cat led the small field as Pine Princess was slightly slow away with Shahrasal never looking comfortable down the inside.
Debut winner Spanish Cat faded right out after going fast early and Yeni produced Pine Princess at the 200m as Littleblacknumber came on strongly for second.
Pine Princess ran on well to win by 0,75 lengths in a time of 58,90 seconds. This was marginally slower than the fillies race won by Beloved Country.
Jockey Muzi Yeni rode the winner
Winning jockey Muzi Yeni said that his mount ‘fell out of the gates’ but that he had tried to get her into the race and had nursed her gradually.
“I squeezed her at the 200m marker and she went on really well,” he said with a broad smile.
Assistant trainer John Buckler said that he envisaged the winner maturing into a nice filly over some more ground in time to come. He said that their first timer Shahrasal would also be a better proposition over 1200m.
Pine Princess was bred by Highlands and is by Captain Al, out of the four time winning Badger Land mare, Scent Of Pine.
She sold for R400 000 on the Cape Premier Yearling Sale Book 1.
Unbeaten in two starts, Pine Princess took her earnings to R123 750.
A bright future lies ahead for her.
