Questioning s/s 106 got the perfect set up to win the
Drill Hall Stakes at Greyville on Saturday. He was positioned in the box seat, ideal for launching a strong closing bid and, given his capacity to accelerate sharply, never really looked in danger.
Vaughan Marshall’s runner has really come well the past few months - scoring in the
Matchem in Spring; just missing in the
King’s Plate; romping in the
Diadem; winning his seasonal opener in KZN and now this convincing triumph where the peerless, Richard Fourie again made no mistakes.
Wish List s/s 106 had to overcome the race profile to take out the
Fillies Guineas. She is in any case better over further, so it is to the Snaith Racing fillies’ credit that she also had to deal with a relatively slow early tempo and some traffic congestion to prevail.
Andrew Fortune pushed her hard to rush through a 22.4 second closing fraction. That is what it took to outduel
Quickstepgal and
Keukenhof who had been vying for honors till she weaved onto the scene.
Star Major s/s 109 was hugely impressive in the
KZN Guineas. James Crawford’s entry came from far back under jockette Michel, posting a 22.6 closing section off a strong pace to knock out odds on favourite,
Tin Pan Alley s/s 106.
Star Major was offered at around 14/1 to snap a sequence of winning favourites, and it took a mighty effort for him to run past most of the field and win.
Ratings for the other beaten horses were
One Eye on Vegas s/s 102;
Happy Verse s/s 102;
Malmesbury Missile s/s 100.
Taxi to the Moon s/s 107 transferred strong Highveld form to the East Coast when racing handy then kicking on in a deep
Condition’s Plate sprint.
Richard Fourie kept him up to his task to see off lightly weighted 100/1 longshot,
Hierarchy s/s 102 and
Lion Rampart s/s 102.
The swooper,
Future Variety s/s 101+ who posted a sub 22 second final 400m to finish, got fourth spot but was just too far back in early stages to make a more telling impact.
Bio: Mark van Deventer has been refining his speed figures for thoroughbred racehorses over three decades. A full-time racing journalist since 2013, he’s known for his integrity and imaginative handicapping, adapting the principles of Andrew Beyer’s figures to South African racecourses.
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