Hollywoodbets Durban July (Grade 1)

Ridgemont Garden Province Stakes (Grade 1)

DEAN Kannemeyer sent out his fourth Hollywoodbets Durban July winner when 14/1 shot The Real Prince got the better of hot favourite Eight On Eighteen by a hard-fought quarter of a length in South Africa’s most famous race at Greyville last Saturday.

Last year’s winner Oriental Charm did himself no favours by pulling hard and the rather sedate pace that he set didn’t suit several of the others either. But everything looked to be going right for the favourite until Craig Zackey’s mount collared him a furlong out and stayed on just the stronger. “I said beforehand that The Real Prince is the best miler in the country and that, if he stayed, there would not be a horse in the country that could beat him,” said Zackey.

“I got a beautiful break and, when I had Eight On Eighteen in my sights, I thought ‘I am going to get there’.”

The winner is a four-year-old by Gimmethegreenlight out of the Trippi mare Real Princess and is owned and bred by Lady Laidlaw’s Khaya Stables. Her breeding operation is managed by bloodstock agent Jehan Malherbe.

“I am thrilled for Lady Laidlaw, who is a great supporter of my yard and this is the second July winner that I have trained for her,” said the Cape Town trainer, who had not raced the gelding since his fourth to Gladatorian in the Drill Hall two months earlier. “We galloped him twice in between, at Summerveld and up the hill,” the trainer recalled.

Garden Province

Justin Snaith, trainer of Eight On Eighteen, had some compensation in the other Grade 1 on the card when Double Grand Slam justified 6/4 favouritism in the Ridgemont Garden Province Stakes.

Champion Richard Fourie had ridden the Vercingetorix four-year-old in her last nine starts, but this time the mount went to Andrew Fortune, whose comeback at 58 is the sort of thing legends are made of – and this colourful character certainly made the most of it!

“What did I tell you?” he asked anyone who cared to listen. “The story just gets better and better. And people want to tell me there is no God!

“For people who are not believers, I say ‘just look at my life’. Six months ago, who would have said that I would be riding a Grade 1 winner for Justin Snaith?”

Snaith, running away with the trainers’ championship, added his own feelings, saying: “This is one of the first races that I felt too nervous to watch. You can find so much trouble and this filly finds it all the time.

“At the July gallops (the previous week), her gallop was sensational – so much so that, had they left the camera on her, she would have started 5/10 here. She is bred in the purple (out of a Captain Al mare) and she will be a serious filly for her breeders, the Varsfontein Stud.”

Two-year-olds

There were also two Grade 2 two-year-old races on the card, both over seven furlongs. The Candice Dawson-trained Chronicle King (by Vercingetorix) sprang a 33/1 shock under Muzi Yeni in the Golden Horseshoe and the Master Of My Fate-sired Anotherdanceforme justified 33/20 favouritism under Fourie in the fillies’ equivalent for Alan Greeff.