To ignore trainer Vijay Singh’s wards on his own turf is simply asking for trouble. The man with the Midas touch recorded an amazing haul of five winners at RCTC on Saturday. After his public choice Romanoff (Nikhil Naidu up) had won the fourth race in the marathon nine-event card, Vijay went on to pick up the last four races on the trot. The odds of his winners were Yuvan (5/1), Commander (10/1), Multiple (6/1) and Akshaya (5/1). The two saddle artists who shared the spoils with him were Neeraj Rawal and Nikhil Naidu – with two apiece. The new riding star on the horizon, Naidu, thus ended up with a well deserved treble.

The main event, The Delhi Race Club Cup, saw nine-year-old Commander (Naidu up)  raise a thunderous gallop in the straight to sail past the front-runner Exodus and register a comfortable victory. The three runners who finished close to each other for the runner-up berth were Rufus, Eternally and Exodus in that order.

Trainer Bharath Singh and jockey Dashrath Singh had a lucrative afternoon as well with a couple of winners at high odds – Kantai and Aquaracer. Kantai (Ravel-Minnie Mouse) bagged the Mossy Bear Handicap in a close contest from Lancaster. Top-weight Multivalue was an impressive third and needs to be followed now that he is getting back his sparkle of old. Sheer Force who ran riderless, was declared a non-starter. It seems apprentice Bhati was still unprepared when the gates opened. Dashrath rode an absolute blinder on maiden two-year-old Aquaracer (Lord Admiral-Watch) who moved with raking strides from the rear of the field to get the better of runaway Guitar Girl close home.

Arti Doctor’s well-prepared colt Pelion (Tazahum-Alandra) had the measure of  Star Phoenix in the day’s opener. The winner has more races in store for him. Backed to favourite status once again, Poras finished a tame third while Solaris burst his blood vessels. Recent migrant Bidstone Hill (Mull Of Kintyre-Indiscretion) made every post of the lower division of The Kabuki Handicap a winning one despite an outside draw of 14. Apprentice Sujit Paswan guided home the Shyam Habbu import. Happy Returns made a brave bid to get the better of the front-runner but to no avail. Likewise, Romanoff (Air Support-Jersey Girl) made every post of the lower division of the same race a winning one.

The BOL Publication Cup turned out to be quite a thriller as the Vijay Singh pair of Yuvan and Duchamp fought all the way down the straight for the day’s closest finish. Yuvan (Arazan-Accessorize) and Neeraj Rawal finally staved off a strong challenge from Duchamp. The favourite Seventh Step had a trying time as the right stirrup iron of Christopher Alford snapped. Nevertheless, the jockey did rather well to complete the 2000m course without any untoward incident. There’s simply no substitute for experience. The senior stipe however admonished the frustrated rider for releasing the reins of the horse after dismounting as the syce concerned was taking a rather long time to come to his aid. There’s no doubt that the syce should have been more alert to his task but then as they say – two wrongs don’t make a right. One sincerely hopes that the champion jockey of the years gone by – once a ‘darling’ of the crowd – can get back into his groove with a few good rides. In the earlier days, some of the punters in the grand and second enclosures would be unable to tell you the name of the horse they have backed but their prompt reply if you asked them would be ‘C.Alford’ – almost implying that the horse’s name was irrelevant.

Multiple (Multidimensional-Al Dente) and Nikhil Nadu won the upper division of the Treasure Land Handicap after a brief contest with Gryffindor. The lower division went to Akshaya (Varenaar-Spiffy) and Neeraj Rawal edge out Stunner at the wire.