Fancied runners fell by the wayside in most of the races in the seven-event card at RCTC on Saturday. However, trainer Patrick Quinn completed a popular brace with Arvak (Sandesh up) and Apalachee (S John astride) to save followers of money from totally emptying their pockets.

In the day’s feature event, Calcutta Colts Trial Stakes, the piping hot favourite Bulgerian from Quinn’s yard failed to justify such blind favouritism and ended up a poor fourth. As far as three-year-olds are concerned, there is obviously a gulf of difference between winning a ‘handicap’ race and a 'terms’ race, especially when the bloodline of the youngster concerned is somewhat mediocre. Blue-blooded Multiple flattered to deceive. It was left to the 7/1 shot Rufus (Lord Admiral-Youre So Beautiful/ Sans Craintes Stud) from the stable of Bharath Singh to peg back Multiple close home. Gracing the wrong end of the seven-horse field for most part of the 1400m trip, Dashrath Singh timed his run to perfection to fetch home the honours astride the property of S Pathy.  The runner-up Multiple is bound to improve after this run. The colt had a clear lead in the straight but lack of experience may have done him in.

Jockey Christopher Alford notched up a narrow victory atop Raunak Banerji-trained Evesham (Tariq – Everybody Counts/ Equus Stud) in the Best Of All Cup. James McKeown’s Shivalik Showers and Shivalik Storm fought tooth and nail for the lead from the word go and this seems to have given Alford the opportunity to make a late bid and pip the duo at the wire. Had Shivalik Showers run all alone up front, the forward miler may well have turned the table on the favourite. The rest of the field of six were never in it.

Trainer Patrick Quinn has been doing fairly well this season and he added to his tally of ten winners with a brace on this day. His Arvak (Phoenix Tower- Little Treasure  /Manjri Stud) was backed to the exclusion of all others and the bottom-weighted gelding with Sandesh in the saddle, moved well in the final furlong to land the spoils close home from the ever reliable Theo. Fabienne was given a forward run, more to measure her potential than anything else. Not too much importance should be attached to her run.

Quinn completed his brace with Apalachee (Serious Spender-Aprillia). S John rode a copybook race on the colt and kept him a handy third behind the front-runners before making his bid in the straight. The runner-up Yamazaki was a surprise package as he was running after a long lay-off.

The afternoon commenced with Jasbir Singh-trained Sicario defying her 5kg winning penalty to produce an encore in the hands of Mohit Singh. The favourite Antares was extremely fractious and had to be withdrawn. Another fancied runner, Sam Houston, burst his blood vessels and suffered a nose bleed.

 Washington (Phoenix Tower-Star Shine/ Manjri Stud) continued to baffle the handicapper with another thumping victory. The filly from Arti Doctor’s yard has been given another identical penalty of 7.5kg which finds her in Class II after two back-to-back effortless wins. The favourite in the Defence Forces Cup was Shohin. The top-weighted colt did rather well despite his 8kg winning penalty to finish a faraway second to Washington (Prashant Dhebe up).

The withdrawal of Lamrei left The Amar Jawan Handicap wide open. The favourite Archivolt tried runaway tactics but his effort came to nought when challenged by Sarfaraz Khan’s Power Of Freedom with apprentice Ranidan in the saddle. The rig by Sharp Attack out of Sweet Pea Jamie (Gee Stud) thus recorded back-to-back wins, having won in the lowest class earlier in the season.