Singforafa scored 105 when only just edged out by Celtic Sea and Run Fox Run in the G1 SA Fillies Sprint in July and she reprised that excellent effort in the Gardenia Stakes at Turffontein – though this time she came out on the right side of the photo.
It was a tight run thing however as Potalo Palace’s daughter only just staved off True To Life who dashed through a 300m – finish sectional of 16.2 seconds with Vernichey (s/s 103) close up in third. This was a strong race measured on the clock, with even the fourth placed finisher, grey filly Anna Capri (s/s 101) emerging with credit.
The Victory Moon Stakes is a G3 event over 1800m and here Christopher Robin (s/s 99 +) stalked the pace before clearing away from battling rivals. His come home sectional was 17.6 seconds, only fair given the circumstances, so it’s hard to get too excited about this performance. It seems that quite a few of his rivals underperformed on the day, gifting the son of Damage is Done a soft victory.
Frosted Gold (has previously run 102 +), in contrast really turned on the boosters coming from last in the straight off a slow pace to pass the entire field in a 1400m Pinnacle Stakes. He finished a full second quicker than Christopher Robin managed, admittedly over a shorter route.
Frosted Gold, by All too Hard, was one of SA’s top sprinting juveniles during 2019, but has experienced mixed success since then over a mile and further. It could be that 1400m is his ideal trip – both starts over this intermediate distance have yielded fluent wins.
Other noteworthy scores of 95 came from Second Base and Castellano as they took out the last two races on Saturday’s card. The former is a smart Gimmethegreenlight filly that has only been defeated once in four race- track sortees. Castellano is well-travelled having raced in KZN, the Western Cape and now Gauteng. Trainer Alec Laird got a solid effort out of him at his second Highveld start, drawing comfortably clear of Anatura (s/s 89).