The Cape Guineas is one of the few big races to have eluded Mike Bass during his near 40-year training career and he has an open mind about whether hot favourite Silver Mountain can put the record straight in the Grand Parade-sponsored classic on Saturday.

He said: “I don’t really know how good she is, and I’m not sure that the press aren’t getting a little bit ahead of themselves.  I can only see what happens on the racecourse which is where it counts.

“At home she just goes along nicely like any other horse and in any case you can’t really tell how good they are at home unless you put them with something really talented and try them.”

Silver Mountain gave the 70-year-old training legend his fourth Cape Fillies Guineas win 11 days ago but he wasn’t really expecting her to win by five lengths. “I was hoping for something like that but I wasn’t sure. She was drawn badly, I thought she might get a bit far back and only get out late.

“I remember Sun Classique running from a 13 draw in 2006, coming from last and only just winning – and she was pretty good. But things went well for Silver Mountain and she won quite comfortably.”

So, how does he expect her to fare on Saturday?  “Whether she is up to beating the colts is debatable. It’s a bit of an ask,” he replied.” I think we can manage the averagely good ones but there are some who haven’t really been exposed and there are also some pretty smart proven colts, big strong horses.

“There are the obvious ones like Mike Azzie’s colt Rabada (who was scratched yesterday) and Johan Janse van Vuuren’s Brazuca while that horse of Gavin van Zyl’s (Budapest) ran a pretty smart race in the Ready To Run, getting away from them like that – although I don’t know if he will be able to do that again. Hopefully it will be a different story on Saturday.”

By Michael Clower

Picture: Mike Bass