A formidable team of international jockeys will participate in The Citizen International Jockeys’ Challenge to be held over two legs next month – Turffontein on Friday night 11 November and Kenilworth on Sunday 13 November.
The Proteas have fully utilised home-ground advantage in all three renewals of the Challenge, but Dublin-born rider Richard Hughes, who will lead the internationals this year, will be determined to make it fourth-time lucky for the visitors this year.
The Citizen Publisher Greg Stewart said he was thrilled with the quality of the international team, which he said would really test the Proteas.
“I think we’ll have a great contest again this year. To be sure the international jockeys are coming here with purpose and not just for a holiday.”
The international side was announced in Cape Town today and Hughes has an enormous depth of talent in his team in Jimmy Fortune (England), Olivier Peslier (France), Tom Queally (Ireland), Jamie Spencer (England) and Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe victor Andrasch Starke from Germany.
The South African team, which will be captained for the second time running by Anton Marcus, comprises Anthony Delpech, Muzi Yeni, Felix Coetzee, Weichong Marwing and Piere Strydom with Sherman Brown the reserve.
Home-ground advantage will not play as big a role this year because three of the international jockeys – Hughes, Fortune and Spencer – have ridden in South Africa before.
Hughes (38) at 1.8m tall is one of the tallest flat-race jockeys in the world and one of the more controversial figures in the UK jockey ranks. He has ridden winners throughout Europe, in Mauritius and at both Turffontein (he won a challenge race in 2009) and Kenilworth (back in 2003). He is fourth on the flat-racing jockeys’ log in Britain this year and his big-race wins include booting now-retired Canford Cliffs to victory in the Queen Anne Stakes and JLT Lockinge Stakes and victory aboard Coup De Ville in the Tattersalls Millions 2yo Trophy, both wins coming courtesy of his father-in-law Richard Hannon. He weighs in at 53kg.
Jimmy Fortune (39), a UK-based Irishman who has freelanced in the last year after forging a successful partnership with John Gosden for a number of years, is one of the few riders to have had the pleasure of partnering star SA sprinter JJ The Jet Plane. Champion apprentice in 1990, Fortune has held many prominent positions in racing, including being retained by the late Robert Sangster, for whom he was an immediate success with victory aboard Commander Collins in the Racing Post Trophy. He has had a quiet time on the Grade 1 front this year and rode in the International Jockeys’ Challenge in 2009. He weighs in at 54kg.
Olivier Peslier (38), four-time French champion jockey (1996, 97, 99 and 2000) and one of the most accomplished riders in the overseas team, is best-known for his recent partnerships with star racemare Goldikova and her half-sister Galokova. He has won a total of five major races on the pair in the last year, including Goldikova’s third Breeders’ Cup Mile in November last year. The son of a stone-mason and born in Chateau Gontier, France, he has very few big races to tick off his honours list, having won major races all over the world including France’s premier horse race, the Arc de Triomphe, three times. He weighs in at 54kg.
Irishman Tom Queally (27), champion apprentice in Ireland in 2000 and in Britain in 2004, has partnered such well-known horses as Frankel, Midday and Timepiece for Sir Henry Cecil this year. He is ninth on the UK jockeys’ log this year with his mounts having earned £2,532,254. He weighs 54.5kg.
Jamie Spencer (31) is related to South African trainer Joey Ramsden and has been crowned champion jockey in both Ireland and England. He is widely regarded as one of the most naturally talented jockeys in Britain and finished fifth on the UK jockeys’ log this season when his big-race wins included victories abroad Aidan O’Brien’s Cape Blanco in the Arlington Million and Joe Hirsch Turf Classic International Stakes and Fame And Glory in the Gold Cup. He has ridden several times at Kenilworth and won a couple of races. He weighs 54kg.
German Andrasch Starke (37) shot to prominence last month when riding Danedream to victory in the 90th Arc de Triomphe. He has contested races all over the world, racing seasonally in Hong Kong where he twice won the Cathay Pacific International Jockeys’ Championship at Happy Valley Racecourse. A strong jockey with “nerves of steel”, according to one source, he weighs 54.5kg.
SA TEAM
South Africa’s ruling champion jockey, Cape Town-born ANTON MARCUS (41), has captained the Proteas to victory in the last two International Jockeys’ Challenges. Marcus, who achieved a 27.9% winning strike rate in taking the jockeys’ title last season, has now won the championship three times following wins in 2000-2001 and 2009-10. His big successes in South Africa last season included the Queen’s Plate aboard Mother Russia, the Gold Medallion on Delago Deluxe and the Garden Province Stakes with Happy Archer. Marcus has ridden with distinction in Dubai, Hong Kong, Mauritius and Singapore and led the Rest of the World team at the 2010 Shergar Cup at Ascot.
Durban-born veteran FELIX COETZEE (52), who has won the South African Jockeys’ Championship three times, has ridden with distinction in South Africa, Dubai, Singapore and Hong Kong where he is best remembered for his association with the Tony Cruz’s mighty Silent Witness. He recently went to Japan to partner Singapore-based sprint star Rocket Man in the Grade 1 Sprinters Stakes (1200m) at Nakayama Racecourse near Tokyo, finishing fourth. A man for the big occasion, he has won nearly every major feature race in South Africa, including the Gold Cup a record-equalling seven times, the Met five times and the Durban July three times.
Having struck up a successful partnership with champion Igugu, Seychelles-born ANTHONY DELPECH (32) had the most successful season of his career in 2010-11 and was pipped on the post by Anton Marcus in the chase for the jockeys’ title. Igugu won three races at the highest level with Delpech aboard and the rider also teamed up to good effect with Shea Shea to win the Golden Horse Casino Sprint at Scottsville. Delpech also won 10 Grade 2 races, including the Victory Moon Stakes at the International Jockeys’ Challenge meeting at Turffontein last year aboard Perana. He has ridden with great success in Mauritius, Hong Kong, Singapore and Dubai and this will be his fourth International Jockeys’ Challenge.
Johannesburg-born WEICHONG MARWING (41) returned to South Africa at the beginning of this season after a couple of years abroad and has done exceptionally well since his return. In Hong Kong last term he rode 32 winners from 400 mounts and placed several times at the highest level on horses like Viva Pataca, on whom he won the 2010 QE II Cup. Champion jockey in South Africa in 1997, he is probably best known for his association with world renowned Mike de Kock and his partnership with the incomparable Horse Chestnut as well as horses like Irridescence and Asiatic Boy. He has ridden with success in Dubai, Australia, Singapore and England.
Five-time SA champion jockey PIERE STRYDOM (45) has also ridden with success in Hong Kong, Australia, Dubai and the UK. Having won well over 4,000 races in his career – and being one of only a few jockeys in the world to have landed six winners at a meeting – he spent four months of the last SA racing season in Hong Kong and still managed a top-20 finish on the local jockeys’ log. This Port Elizabeth-born jockey’s most important success last season was when driving JJ The Jet Plane to a nose victory over Rocket Man and Felix Coetzee in the Grade 1 Cathay Pacific Hong Kong Sprint at Sha Tin in December. Strydom has been a member of the Proteas at the last three Jockeys’ Challenges and won the individual challenge last year.
Well-liked Durban-born jockey MUZI YENI (25), who has ridden 446 winners in his career, rode in the International Jockeys’ Challenge for the first time in 2010 and was the leading rider at the Turffontein leg. Having come within two winners of his century in the 2009-10 season, he went all out to ensure he passed that milestone last term, riding 1,246 horses for 133 wins. He scored his first Grade 1 victory when partnering Happy Landing in the President’s Champions Challenge at Turffontein this year. His only off-shore international experience came early last year when he rode in an international jockeys’ invitational in Korea and notched a winner at the meeting.
Harare-born SHERMAN BROWN (36), at 1.7m one of the tallest jockeys around, won the Mauritius jockeys’ premiership in 2008 in his final full season there. He enjoyed one of his best years in South Africa in 2010-11, when he finished fifth on the SA jockeys’ log with 116 winners. Known for his association with the late Buddy Maroun and star sprinter Golden Loom, he has also ridden in with success in Harare and the United Arab Emirates.
The teams will compete in four races at each of the meetings and points will be scored according to finishing positions. There will be a draw for mounts in each of the challenge races and the runners will be seeded beforehand in order to equalise the chances of the two teams as much as is possible.
The stakes for the five handicap races at the Turffontein fixture have been boosted. Four of them – a MR 92 Handicap over 1800m, a MR 90 Handicap over 1400m and two MR 86 Handicaps over 1400m and 2450m respectively – will each carry a stake of R120,000 (normally from R83,000 to about R95,000), while the MR 78 Handicap will carry a stake of R90,000. Two feature races will be run at the meeting, the R300,000 Victory Moon Stakes (Grade 2) and the R135,000 Gardenia Handicap (Listed).
The topliner at Kenilworth on Sunday 13 is the R300,000 Betting World Merchants (Grade 2).
The international team will also compete against a six-member “Rising Star’’ team – which is still to be announced – at each meeting.
