The supporting event to the Eveready Calcutta Derby was the Alokananda Stakes restricted to three-year-old fillies. The 6/4 favourite Deserving Visit (China Visit- Deserving Lady) who won the sprint, looks like a champion in the making as this was her maiden start and she quite easily accounted for the field in a smart timing of 1min 12.2sec, which was just half a second worse than Dandified’s timing the day before. The Vijay Singh-trained filly followed stablemate Azienda till the distance post before Neeraj Rawal reminded her of the task ahead and she sailed past Azienda, despite running a little green. Sylvana moved up to be a good second but the disappointment in the race was the winner of two races – Pretty Woman.

The afternoon commenced with Suraj Narredu riding a forceful finish atop Fire Falcon to land the spoils in a close contest in the race for the Brave Dancer Cup. Patrick Quinn’s ward lapped up the extra distance as John astride top-weight Haddock came with a fluent run along the rails, only to lose by a whisker.

John however made amends in the very next race, the upper division of the Xisca Cup, as he made the seven-furlong event a start-to-finish affair while astride Impressive Glory. The other fancied runner Fiery Ciel was a faraway second. They have both known to bleed before but the cool weather and cloudy atmosphere must have helped their cause.

The lower division of the same event went to Vijay Singh-trained Axstone (C.Alford up). The small made colt by Multidimensional out of Stolen Kisses followed Marauder till the bend before kicking clear and staying there under Alford’s whip. While Drop The Pressure ran a good second, both Valerosa (heavily under the whip) and Massachusettes were a trifle disappointing.

Vijay Singh’s Mr Gorgeous won the Zara Shah Cup after a brief struggle in the straight with Marilyn. The latter ran a forward race but found nothing extra when challenged by the favourite. The unlucky runner-up was Triumphus who was taken out by Krishna as a result of the domino effect created by Sandesh and Mr Gorgeous forcing a passage between Krishna and Marilyn when there was insufficient room. Had Triumphus not lost that precious ground, he may well have come up trumps as the winner went flat out.

The owner of Triumphus, Mr Joydeep Datta Gupta, was however amply compensated in the afternoon’s final event when Dashrath Singh rode an absolute blinder astride the 6/1 shot Hurricane Star to land the spoils in The Telegraph Cup. Macedonian and John had threatened to steal a march after a good jump-out but Dashrath timed his mount’s run to perfection, to peg back the front-runner close home.

The honour of the afternoon’s biggest and most successful gamble went to Sabeel Sharif’s Gararo. It was a creditable piece of speculation as it was implemented with the help of second-tier jockey Shobhan Babu from the 13^th draw. The connections had missed making the most of Divine Symphony’s win one day earlier and this gamble was truly a Derby-day boon.

That jockey Christopher Alford saves his best for a big occasion was evident when he piloted nine-year-old Arktouros to a thumping victory in the Hyderabad Race Club Cup. Like Dandified, Alford is sentimentally attached to Arktouros, who fetched him his 1000^th winner couple of monsoons earlier. The big-hearted horse ran a 2200 metres race on New Year’s Day won by stablemate Argiano. That forward run undoubtedly helped his cause while favourite Lantana Lady was simply outclassed.