KINGSTON, Jamaica - On another quiet Sunday afternoon, the form players had little to complain about as most of the fancied starters raced competitively to make the frame in the early events.
In the opener with a triple 24 hours earlier, Tevin Foster moved his tally to four winners for the two-day weekend race card. Custer, saddled by Alford Brown, was not alert at the start but his in-form rider urged him sprinting after the leader to assume the advantage early in the home stretch. Foster needed no extra jockeyship skills to persuade the gelding to score by four lengths going away from his seven rivals on the 1,000-metre round course.
Owned and trained by Edward Stanberry, Dream Of Paris (5-2) led and was always clear over the 1,600 metres of race two under veteran reinsman Paul Francis’ specialised front running preference, which has evolved into an art throughout his career to date.
Trainer Patrick Lynch saddled Gone A Negril (3-1) and Prosecco (4-5) to finish ahead of the field in that order. Ridden by two-kilo claimer Matthew Bennett, Gone A Negril’s late burst of finishing speed took him clear close to the end of the 1,300-metre gallop of race three.
Saddled by Courtney Richards, consistent nine-year-old chestnut gelding Stanislaus (6-5) was in front at the winning line for the 15th occasion in his 77-race career. Former three-time champion jockey Anthony Thomas, for his third success in 24 hours, imparted little or no persuasion to the old battler over the 1,000 metres of the fourth event.
The form players in the North Lounge at Caymanas remained in good voice as 3-5 favourite Babla winning Division I of the featured maiden 1,200-metre sixth event run to honour the memory of consummate horseman John Clifton Wright. This was the opener of double success for both jockey Jawara Steadman and trainer Richard Azan. Following this success, Azan was only absent from the winners’ enclosure for half an hour as his colt, 4-5 favourite Slammer, won the 1,200-metre race six easily for champion jockey Dane Dawkins’ first of two on the day. Steadman’s turn came in race 10.
Run as the seventh, Division II of the John Clifton Wright, Norblar, owned and trained by second-generation horseman Gresford Smith, controlled the early fractions of the 1,200-metre contest and scored by six and a half lengths to confirm Dawkins’ second.
As things stand three race days into the second half of the season, the contenders for 2023 riding championship honours are positioned with Reyan Lewis out front on 58, champion Dane Dawkins 44, Tevin Foster on 43 and former three-time titlist Anthony Thomas the trailer at 37.
Two-kilo claimer Jordan Barrett, riding 16/1 shot My Smokey for Donovan Plummer, brought a temporary end to celebratory noises at the end of race eight contested over the 1,000 metres of the round course.
The confidence of the form players returned in the ninth. The Michael Thomas-conditioned second season Futurity campaigner Acknowledgeme (Bebeto Harvey) bet at 2-1 proved to be more than seven lengths superior to nine competitive rivals over the 1,100-metre gallop.
However, the failure of even money favourite Brinks, who performed as if something was wrong in finishing 12th in the 15-horse field of the closing event, ensured the background celebratory noise disappeared. Green Gold Rush (9-1) proved to be four-kilo claimer Steadman’s most memorable and successful day in the saddle with this, the second of his two winners. Green Gold Rush, trained by Dalton Sirjue, a six-year-old chestnut progeny of Adore The Gold, performed well in recent races to be on the frame in races won by champion thoroughbreds Atomica and Further And Beyond.
This belated improvement in form gives Dalton Sirjue the Training Feat Award, Green Gold Rush the Best Winning Gallop Accolade and Steadman a second Jockeyship Award for his performance in a close finish requiring the full skill set with the emphasis on judgement of pace, balance and composure. There was only the space of a length and three parts shared by the first five horses to finish.
