Tellytrack has really just gone downhill since Nico Kritsiotis stepped down from a management role some time ago. Friday evening’s studio production was one of their worst ever and they just never seemed to get any better. Besides making Jimmy Lithgow look like a mug, they seem to believe that their viewers will accept the sub-standard nonsense forever.
It was the universal view at Friday’s gallops at Summerhill, that this was the best catalogue the Ready To Run had assembled.
Michael Roberts will contest the South African trainers championship in the not to distant future.
The jockey duel fizzles out at Turffontein on an afternoon where trainer Lucky Houdalakis and jockey Donovan Mansour celebrate a great double.
Michael or Muis as he is affectionately known had a brilliant career as a jockey becoming one of the first foreign jockeys ever to become Britain’s champion jockey.
The number of entries compares favourably in quantum with recent years, with 58 first entries received in 2024, 60 in 2023, 68 in 2022, 53 in 2021, 52 in 2020, 49 in 2019, and 69 in 2018
Ironically, it was a colt which provided Alan with a first Gr1 success, this being Alec and Gillian Foster’s homebred Cereus, who landed the 2001 Gold Cup at Hollywoodbets Greyville, his victory completing a momentous double on the day, with the Gr2 Golden Slipper having gone the way of juvenile filly Tatler, a great-great-great grandaughter of Sun Lass!
JP van der Merwe is not the only guilty party in the matter. In simple terms, he is the only rider to have exercised the NHA’s offer of an Acknowledgement Of Guilt and moved on with his life
Andrew Fortune made it three winners on the Family Day public holiday as Tenango breezed home to win the Gr3 feature
