The Championships Finale day at Turffontein on Saturday proved a red-letter occasion of some proportions for the Ridgemont team.
The Kieswetter family operation in the magnificent Robertson valley has continued as a nursery of champions since their takeover from the Beck family in 2017, and is home to an illustrious line-up of sires, including the latest new addition to their ranks of dual Gr1 winning sprint star Thunderstruck – a son of their boom sire, Rafeef.
Saturday proved a day to remember for Ridgemont, with three home-bred feature winners, and their sires past and present, accounting for four features on the bumper card.
Ridgemont bred Canford Cliffs’ daughter Simply Majestic was first off the mark, landing the Gr3 TAB Pretty Polly Stakes. The speedy galloper has not missed the money in four starts for two wins and looks set to compete in the juvenile features down in KZN during the SA Champions Season.
Simply Majestic (Gavin Lerena) withstood the late challenge of Famous Lady (S’manga Khumalo) to register her first stakes victory (Pic – JC Photos)
Ridgemont’s red-hot sire Rafeef, set to stand for R120 000 in 2024, celebrated a dazzling double with his daughters Mrs Browning and Beating Wings winning the Gr2 TAB Camellia Stakes and Gr2 TAB Igugu Stakes, respectively.
The feature double again highlighted Rafeef’s extraordinary versatility as a sire, with Mrs Browning scoring over 1160m, and her paternal half-sister victorious over 2000m.
Classy four-year-old Mrs Browning, victorious in the Gr3 Joburg Tourism Carry On Alice Stakes earlier in the season, picked up her biggest win to date in the process.
A full-sister to Gr1 World Sports Betting SA Derby winner Aragosta, who placed fourth in the TAB Gr2 Colorado King Stakes on the same day, Mrs Browning has now won six of 14 starts.
Mrs Browning went from gun to tape under Craig Zackey to register her second stakes win (Pic – JC Photos)
She is out of the Galileo mare Miss Galidora and is bred on a similar cross to that which produced Australian five-time Gr1 winner and successful sire The Autumn Sun.
Rafeef is also the sire of another high-class filly in the form of the Ridgemont bred Beating Wings. The latter made it four wins from just seven starts when she won Saturday’s R350 000 Gr2 Igugu Stakes. She hails from an old Ridgemont family, and looks a lady with a very bright future.
The fourth champagne moment for the leading breeders came in the marathon TAB Listed Gold Bowl, when the evergreen Crimson King, a son of their iconic late champion stallion Dynasty (Fort Wood), powered home to register his fifth win.
Bred by Ridgemont, the gallant winner is out of the three-time winning Mogok mare, Cup Of Rubies, a half-sister to 2007 Durban July winner Hunting Tower.
