Manvendra Singh-trained Artesia proved that she is no mean customer as the winner of the Oaks and Leger left the field standing in the mile race for the Manohar Lal Memorial Cup. With this victory she might have also run her last handicap event for quite some time now. Like Dandified, she is likely to run only in ‘terms’ races from here on. Lying a handy fourth along the rails, while Aerator set a scorching pace and Montezuma and Lantana Lady followed, Christopher Alford merely showed the public choice a clear path in the home straight and the strongly built filly did the rest. Lantana Lady – very much a handicap horse, was simply outclassed, as was Montezuma.

The afternoon commenced with followers of C.Alford taking a beating on Commelina. The favourite finished nowhere after a bit of early speed and on this showing may become a ‘bookies’ darling’, much like Chhundu. The quietly gambled Fankaar decided to put his best foot forward on this occasion. After being fancied a couple of times by form-workers, he was thought to be ‘hibernating’ for just such a day. In-an-out racing, especially in the lowest class, is not only the bane at this centre, but elsewhere also. The stipes would do well to make a note of professionals who resort to this ploy to hoodwink the paying public, and come down on them. After all, we all want to improve the standard of racing at our home centre as much as possible. Recent winner Eternal Instinct ran a good race and finished runner-up.

Bharath Singh-trained Valerosa was powerfully handled by top-weight jockey S. John to land the spoils in the Prince Manoj Handicap. Though she lost some ground at the start, John bided his time at the rear of the field, along the rails. The front-runner Winnertakesitall shot her bolt at the top of the straight when Zegna took over the running and favourite Abrienda made her run on the outside. However, neither of them had much of a chance as Valerosa moved with telling strides under John’s strong handling. Once she headed the field, she won quite comfortably.

Vijay Singh-schooled Blue Lightning (Shailesh Shinde up) made every post a winning one in the six furlong sprint for the Fusebox Handicap. Speedster Fire Angel followed her all the way and failed to collar her despite Dashrath Singh’s best efforts.

Dashrath however made amends in the last race of the day when he brought Deepak Karki’s Daylite (Phoenix Town-Nightlife) with a fluent run on the wide outside, to reproduce his impressive mock-race work-out and come up trumps. Though the chestnut travelled wide all the way, in the end he had no trouble getting the better of rank outsider and front-runner Law Supremo who looked as if he may pull it off inside the distance. The favourite Triumphus was an unimpressive fifth and may have needed the run, as may have another fancied runner Marilyn.

Shafiq Khan’s Hurricane Andrew made every post a winning one in the hands of Sameer Khan and succeeded in keeping at bay top-weight Richest Treasure who closed as the favourite and ran a good second in The Glotik Handicap. He will be worth keeping an eye on.