Barring Rachmaninoff in the Stoney Valley Plate for Maiden three-year-olds, not a single favourite obliged in a card of seven races at the RCTC on the opening day of the rainy season. Furthermore, it was observed that front running fancied runners were coming apart in the final furlong as their strides shortened on the well-watered monsoon track with a penetrometer reading of 1.7.

That jockey Christopher Alford still has it in him to pull something out of a hat was evident when Bharath Singh and him completed a well deserved treble with Atheist (Stern Opinion – Ching Mai) who was available at 10/1. The filly had not had a single notable run during winter and it was to Bharath’s credit that he brought her into a forward, winning condition  purely on early morning track-work. C. Alford of course  rode one hell of a race to get the better of Treasure Island in the final stride. Jockey Shailesh Shinde was fined Rs 3,000/- for excessive use of the stick on Treasure Island. The public choice Silken Grace had sufficient opportunity to forge ahead in the straight but finished an unimpressive third.  Three-year-olds are known to struggle on the monsoon track in the early part of the season and the fancied pair of Silken Grace and Cocoanut were no exception.

The feature event, The Arizona  Pie Handicap, saw Anastasio being backed to the exclusion of all others but the Bath-trained gelding appeared to be in too much of a hurry to see the winning post and ran out of steam in the final 100 metres. Sitting and watching the proceeding from the fifth slot, C.Alford started working on Suzanna  (Win Legend-Just Amazing/ Dashmesh Stud) from the top of the straight and the filly gathered momentum near the distance post when the public choice was drastically shortening his strides. Heavy-weight King Kong was thrown out of gear by the initial speed of Anastasio and ended up a tame third.  

Displaying considerable faith in her maiden apprentice RS Bhati, Arti Doctor’s stable backed Empowerd down to joint favouritism with Rachmaninoff (Sussex-Beaucare/ Pratap Stud) in the Stoney Valley Plate. The lad did well to take the speedy filly to the front in the sprint but had no answer to C. Alford’s finishing power on the top-weight. Apprentice coach Philip Alford spoke to this correspondent after the races and opined that all the boys still have a lot to learn. He could not single out any one of them as more promising than the others. Possibly, they will be far better equipped to ride fancied runners after the monsoon meet.

The first two races saw winners at long odds and set the trend for the day. Richard Alford trained Colourful Dreams (Diffident-Act Smart/ Yervada Stud) made every post a winning  one despite drifting out in the straight. Jockey Anil Bandaal was clever enough not to fight the drift and let the ix-year-old mare run her own race. Half-money favourite Avilome Vilome chased the winner all the way and eventually lost out the runner-up berth to Kanha.

Like Atheist, Javed Khan-trained Xipen (New Famous-Xray/ Yeravada Stud) had no winter form to go by but produced a scintillating run in the straight in the hands of Nirmal Jodha to peg back heavily gambled favourite No Politics Please at the post.

Javed Khan completed a brace when his seven-year-old Bucharest (Placerville-Bratz/ Poonawalla Stud) got the better of runaway Annie Oakley close home. The favourite Fire Song came into season and let down a host of followers.

The curtain came down with Arti Doctor-trained Lucky Streak (Tariq-Silken Magic/ Equus Stud) being given a flawless ride by Nikhil to land the spoils in The Pentagon Handicap. Favourite Bindass was a tame third while the others like Top Line and Clairvoyance were also-rans.