Imtiaz Sait-saddled Sedona also impressed when registering her second successive victory of the season. The chestnut mare by Don’t Forget Me out of Stop It Dear went wire to wire over the mile-long trip for the Rajpipla Trophy and managed to stave off the challenge of Southern Star towards the end journey. C. Rajendra was impeccable astride Sedona.
Astor Place (Placerville-Nef) proved to be the biggest disappointment of the day. This Vijay Mallya-owned filly took charge from Jaannisar at the top of the home stretch but gave a flat-footed response to Pesi Shroff’s urgings. Astor Place struggled to repel the attack launched by Kraft and before these two horses could settle the dispute, Cacophony (Razeen-Hourglass) produced a sparkling run to shock them all. After his disappointing run just four days earlier, Kraft’s performance was a revelation and he should be among the winners before long.
Frenchman Chris Lemaire continued his good form in the saddle and gave remarkable assistance to Royal Standard (Regal Sabre-Single Storey) in the opening event. Though lying in the rear for most of the journey, Chris showed enough maturity in riding her plain hands and heels after coming through the shortest way home. Once put into top gear by Chris, Royal Standard breezed past Reaching Out and Star Status to taste success that had managed to elude her thus far. Star Status, bred as half-brother to the winner, managed to wrest the second berth from Reaching Out.
Taken on a start-to-finish mission by Niall McCullagh, Amaron (Batzushka-Tunanza) from veteran Saeed Shah’s yard kicked on to upset the applecart of the fancied horses in this race. In his attempt to follow trainer Robert D’Mellow’s instructions to settle Momentous Mover in the third or fourth position, jockey Harish Rathod fought with his mount who appeared too keen to settle down. Rathod finds himself in the dock for his alleged incompetence. The performance of Chris Lemaire astride the favourite Smart Warrior and also that of Mark Gallagher aboard Miss Sunshine has come under scrutiny in this race. It was rather surprising to see both these foreign riders give Niall the leeway in the earlier half of the mile journey that proved difficult to bridge in the latter half.
Jockey K. P. G. Appu wrapped up the day’s proceedings with a fine double in association with trainer Hormuz Antia’s duo Habit (Serious Spender-Sharanella) and Spring Time (Brave Hunter-Summer Honey). The former survived a close call against Mystic Lady but the latter won undeterred. Interestingly, Spring Time was an expensive failure both in the “monsoon” season at Pune and also during “winter” at Mumbai. It was only appropriate that the filly won as the summer season sets in or was it that the connections were waiting for the appropriate price to make a kill?
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