Gold Circle Pty (Ltd)

Today's Racing :

All on track for titanic clash

David Thiselton
The two big horses for the Cape Sizzling Summer Season, Pocket Power and Big City Life, are both on track for their likely titanic clashes in the Queen’s Plate and J&B Met in January.
Big City Life
Glen Kotzen said yesterday that Vodacom Durban July winner, Big City Life, was doing very well and will have his first gallop since his layoff at Kenilworth on Saturday morning.
Kotzen’s dual Grade 1 winner, Lady Windermere, who was last season’s Equus three-year-old Champion Filly, will also gallop on Saturday.
“We would have liked to have put Big City Life in the Merchants and then the Green Point, before the Queen’s Plate and the Met, but this year there is only one week separating the Merchants and Green Point,” said Kotzen.
“We will choose one or the other according to how his preparation goes.”
The Merchants over 1200m is on November 14 with the Green Point over 1 600m on November 21.
Interestingly, Lady Windermere is going to avoid the big sprints during the summer and her chief targets will be the Grade 1 Paddock Stakes over 1 800m on January 9 (Queen’s Plate day) and the Grade 1 Majorca Stakes over 1 600m on January 30 (J&B Met day) respectively.
Of his three-year-olds, Kotzen said that the Dynasty colt, Paddy O’Reilly, who has won his last two, will go for the same race Big City Life won over 1 600m at Fairview last season. He might then have a crack at The Selangor.
The Grade 2 Debutante winner, Captain’s Call, will make her comeback in a 1 400m race in a month’s time before going for the two Grade 1 events over 1 600m, the Fillies Guineas on December 5 and the Majorca.
Grade 2 placed Aim High will also be coming out soon.
Pocket Power
Mike Bass said that Pocket Power had had a few “niggly problems”, but they had eventually been able to “get him going”.
He thought that his comeback would be in the Grade 2 Diadem Stakes over 1 200m on December 19, before attempting to win both the Queen’s Plate and J&B Met for the fourth time in succession.
Bass said that River Jetez would probably be going for the Paddock Stakes and Majorca this season.
He regarded Captain’s Secret as probably his best three-year-old for the summer.
The three-year-old Captain Al gelding has had three easy and impressive wins over 1200m after six starts.
Versatile duo
Bass said that Blue Tiger and Gaultier, who finished second and third respectively in last season’s Grade 1 Cape Flying Championship over 1 000m a week before the Met, are very versatile and he had a variety of options for them.
He mentioned the four-year-old Fort Vogue as a horse who has improved as he has matured.
“We don’t do too much with our three-year-olds,” he said. “I took him down to Durban only because he was a horse I wanted to look after myself.”
He said that by the same token he would now be looking to see how the likes of the four-year-olds Rushing Wind and Test Pilot and the five-year-old Air Combat had come on as they had matured and viewed them as possibilities for achievement during the summer.

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