The majority of punters were left with burnt fingers at RCTC on Saturday as leap-year jockey Sk. Israil sealed off a day of upsets with a thumping victory on friendless Rabda (Ravel-Ekta Ekta Ekta) to get the better of piping hot public choice  Lady Two in The Supernova Handicap. Israil took the Bharath Singh-trained four-year-old gelding to the front as the gates opened and stayed there all  the way. Lady Two (C. Alford up) had all the chances in the straight but failed to collar the front-runner.

After her controversial defeat exactly a month earlier when her rider was unjustly blamed, blue-blooded filly Friendship and jockey Christopher Alford made amends with a runaway victory in the Amazing Plate. Though she was a trifle fractious at the gates, Alford had the Arti Doctor-trained filly by Multidimensional out of Alvarita (Usha Stud) under control from the word go. Allowing owner-mate Archivolt to call the shots till the distance post, Friendship sailed into the lead in the straight and pulled away from the field. The one for the notebook is Archivolt who ran a great race after finishing runner-up over sprints twice in the lower class. In this mile race, the scale was raised by 6kg so that the top-weight Demonstrate ran at 60kg. The latter is another for the notebook.     

Trainer Patrick Quinn’s Siempre Nueva (which incidentally is the Spanish for Always New) pulled off another narrow victory when she bagged The Thrifty Allan Handicap in a blanket finish. In doing so, the speedy mare By Arazan out of Zarandja (Poona Stud) pegged back the challenge of the course favourite Glorious Leaps (C. Alford up) who was threatening to bag top honours in the straight. Apprentice Vikram rode a copybook race on the winner on this occasion, in sharp contrast to her earlier victory where he had lost his right stirrup iron.

In the mile race for the Brown Wolf Handicap, Raunak Banerji’s Joss (Arazan-Sprungli/ Poona Stud) showed that the mile trip is very much his cup of tea. Hindu Singh on the eventual winner was a handy fourth while fancied runners Lochinvar and The Stradle followed pace-setters I Told You Know and Rachmaninoff . However, the duo found the pace too hot and retired from the fray quite early in the race. It was left to Joss to issue the final challenge before pulling away for an easy triumph.

The opening race saw a keen contest between Shafiq Khan’s Fly Fly and Sarfaraz Khan’s Power Of Freedom (Sharp Attack-Sweet Pea Jamie/ Gee Stud) before the latter prevailed much to the delight of his rider Afzal Khan. Third placed horse Arion who did much of the spadework will be worth following in the future.

The next race, The Goldliner Handicap saw another close contest between Cool Conquerer and favourite Panchovilla. Mohit Singh on Cool Conqueror (Kingda Ka-Amount/ Nanoli Stud) got the better of the public choice who may have done better with better help from the saddle. Similarly, Xited was also the victim of poor handling and finished in the ruck.