Juice Man wins classic in Trinidad

The Lakeland Farms bred and Glenn Mendez trained Juice Man (Storm Craft – Passion) with Ricky Jadoo astride, soured the as­pi­ra­tion of Re­gal In­ten­sion win­ning lo­cal rac­ing's sec­ond leg in the “Triple Crown” se­ries, when he pock­eted the TT$96,150 first prize cheque im­pres­sive­ly by 1 3/4 lengths.

Interestingly, horses bred in Jamaica, finished first, second, fourth, fifth and sixth in the Classic.

Juice Man su­perbly rid­den by Jadoo stopped the Patrick Hus­bands rid­den Apoc­a­lypse with pre-race favourite Re­gal In­ten­sion back in fourth in the fea­ture Mid­sum­mer Clas­sic over 1,900 me­tres at San­ta Rosa Park, Ari­ma on Thurs­day last.

Mendez land­ed his sev­enth suc­cess in the event while Jadoo was win­ning the clas­sic for the third time.

The Justyn Kan­ta Per­sad owned Juice Man was a well-backed joint-sec­ond favourite be­hind the John O'Brien trained Apoc­a­lypse which was favoured at even-mon­ey.

When the starter sent the sev­en-horse field on its way Blue Nav­i­ga­tor and No­bel Abrego went straight in­to the lead from Re­gal In­ten­sion with Juice Man in third and Apoc­a­lypse in fourth. They were fol­lowed by Maren­go with Mak­ing Head­lines fol­low­ing and She's So Spec­tac­u­la at the rear of the sev­en-horse field.

Go­ing down the back-straight Blue Nav­i­ga­tor still held sway but Juice Man and Jadoo took clos­er or­der and moved in­to a joint-sec­ond place with Re­gal In­ten­sion as Apoc­a­lypse and Hus­bands watched every move of their main ri­vals.

Mak­ing Head­lines was still in touch along with Maren­go as She's So Spec­tac­u­lar dropped fur­ther back and hoist the white flag sug­gest­ing, some­thing was amiss.

At the far turn, Juice Man was sent to join Blue Nav­i­ga­tor as Re­gal In­ten­sion was rid­den to keep pace as Hus­bands brought Apoc­a­lypse in­to a chal­leng­ing po­si­tion and looked omi­nous.

The race be­gan to un­fold at the top of the straight as Jadoo sent the son of Storm Craft for home and he quick­ened up as Hus­band gave Apoc­a­lypse the sig­nal to go win his race but, Jadoo asked the Ja­maican bred colt for more and he re­spond­ed to pulled fur­ther clear of Apoc­a­lypse for an im­pres­sive vic­to­ry. Mak­ing Head­lines was third.

Juice Man record­ed the time of 2:00.90 for the trip.

Jamaican breeders had two more winners on the eight-race card. The first event was won by the Derick Latibeaudiere bred five-year-old bay gelding Hello by Storm Craft – Ecstatic while the eighth race was taken by the four-year-old bay colt, Towering (Adore The Gold – Tejano Symphony) bred by Argyll Farms Limited.