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Tr. Rajesh Narredu when afforded an opportunity to explain the improved performance of his charge b h MANDELA as compared to its previous outings in Race no. 125 run on 3rd March, 2024 and Race No. 145 run on 23rd March, 2024, stated that:-

1. “I have taken charge of MANDELA in February 2024 from Mr. Srinivas Reddy and he was shifted directly to Kolkata, and I knew very little about the horse other than his performance on paper. 

2. The horse was given a mock race on 21st Feb 2024 where he led until the bend and fizzled out, due to which I thought he was better off at sprinting distance as he also showed a lot of initial pace.

3. Subsequently he was run in an 1100 metre race on 3rd March 2024, where he was well beaten for initial speed and in the end by the new track record holder "LA DOMINATE".

4. The owners and I thought the race may have come too quickly for him and decided to give him some more time but keep him at the sprinting distance and ran him again over 1200 mtrs on 23rd March 2024, where he was ridden by Akshay Kumar where he ran a slightly better race finishing 5th about 5¼ lengths behind the eventual winner.

5. Jockey Akshay Kumar after the race stated to me that he had previously ridden this horse and won over 1600 meters and that he felt the horse was a very one paced kind of a horse and a longer steadier galloping kind of a race will suit him and that we should try to run him over a longer trip only.

6. With the Jockey’s feed back and the fact that the season was coming to an end we found this race, though it was coming very early, and after seeing the entries we felt that the company is very average and that the horse could fair better in this race.

7. The horse was accepted in this race and with a small field of 4 runners, the front running tactics helped the horse in maintaining a very even gallop all through out and under a very capable ride of Jockey Vivek G helped the horse to win.

8. The owners and I have decided to try and keep this horse at trips ranging from 1600 mtrs upwards in future”.

His explanations were noted.