Hollywoodbets Cape Guineas (Group 1)

LAST season’s champion two-year-old Jan Van Goyen totally outclassed his rivals in the Hollywoodbets Cape Guineas at Kenilworth last Saturday - and was promptly slashed from 11/1 to 5/1 favourite for the King’s Plate on January 10th when he takes on the top older horses for the first time.

Callan Murray waited until just over a furlong out before pressing the button and his mount (by Master Of My Fate out of a mare by Irish-bred Oratorio) accelerated like a good thing to slam second favourite Happy Verse by two and three-quarter lengths.

Murray said: “I have always known that this horse had the ability to win a race like this as easily as he did, but we had a big question mark with the travel - I rode him work in Johannesburg on Tuesday morning and on Thursday morning I rode him work here in Cape Town.

“There was a bit of carnage early on in the race but I didn’t panic - I knew the gears that he has. He is easy to ride and he really put them away.”

The winner is trained by Mike de Kock in partnership with his son Matthew, who said: “We had super confidence in this horse and I’m glad that it has come to fruition.

“I think he is actually getting better and I would now like to take on the older horses to see where we really stand.”

Jan Van Goyen was raised at the Boland Stud and was sold for R600,000 (€30,365) at last year’s KZN Yearling Sale.

Oisin Murphy

Horse of the Year Eight On Eighteen will be among those in opposition in the King’s Plate on January 10th and Oisin Murphy will fly out to ride him, even though this will be the horse’s first run of the season.

The de Kock father and son team also won the Ridgemont Green Point Stakes with the Murray-ridden Dave The King. The six-year-old is bred and part-owned by Gary Player, and is by the American-bred Global View out of a Jet Master mare. The 25/2 chance was in the first two throughout and just held on from 40/1 shot Garrix.

De Kock senior said: “It’s wonderful to see Gary with a few nice horses at this time in his life (the golfing legend is 90)and I do believe that the horse has a little bit more in him and that he will come on from this run.”

But the one that really caught the eye here was See It Again. Running for the 27th time, the Michael Roberts-trained six-year-old lost several lengths fly-jumping at the start, but he really flew home and was only beaten just over half a length in third.

Outlaw King, winner of last year’s SplashOut Cape Merchants under Sean Veale, repeated the performance with now regular partner Craig Zackey sending the Rafeef gelding to the front a furlong and a half from home and keeping him going to beat the Veale-ridden I Am Giant by just a fifth of a length.

Trainer Dean Kannemeyer said: “I was thrilled with that performance, particularly as I thought it was going to be pretty difficult today.”

Justin Snaith, second and third in the Cape Guineas with Happy Verse and Randolph Hearst, had some compensation when Regulation took the Grade 3 Peninsula Handicap 35 minutes later.