S’Manga Khumalo, who this week will pass through the 1 000-ride marker for the season, says that it was in February that he really decided to put his foot down in earnest and go for a second successive jockeys’ championship.

He explained: “I was doing quite well for Sean Tarry at the stage and his horses were really flying. I thought ‘I’m still young and I’m still fresh. From now on I must try and travel everywhere as I did last season and hopefully it will pay off.’

“But I also said to myself that, if it goes the other way and I don’t win it, I can still be happy because at least I have won it once before.

“Going round the country, getting rides and support, has shown me that I just have to give it a try. It’s not like I’m riding just in Jo’burg, I am riding everywhere and getting the support.”

He admits that he makes a conscious effort not to worry about how Gavin Lerena and the others are doing, or get concerned when they ride a double (or worse, a treble!).

He said: “I have to try not to let any of that get to me because, if I do, it is just going to put the pressure on. I have to make sure that I enjoy what I’m doing and just carry on doing the best I can.”

Lerena, his nearest pursuer and now almost certainly his biggest danger, still bears the scars of three seasons ago when his once commanding lead was gradually whittled away. On the final day of the season he was pipped on the post by an Anton Marcus double. He was left devastated and famously declared “I am heartbroken.”

He said yesterday: “At the beginning of the season every jockey wants to go for the championship but what happened that time made be a bit scared of doing so because I didn’t want to lose again. But it also made me more determined.

“I just made up my mind to ride as many winners as I can this season and make sure that I enjoy doing so.”

By Michael Clower

Picture: S’Manga Khumalo (Liesl King)

The Brett Crawford-trained Tiger Ridge filly Maybe Yes proved her liking for Greyville last time out in a Conditions Plate for fillies and mares over 1400m when waltzing in by four lengths and she will be a big runner over the same course and distance in Saturday’s Gr 2 Tibouchina Stakes for fillies and mares.

Meanwhile, the yard’s stalwart three-year-old Dynasty filly Alexis, who impressed when winning the Gr 2 KRA Fillies Guineas, had a slight recent setback, so they couldn’t take a chance with her in either the Gr 1 Woolavington 2000 or the Tibouchina, but she is back in full work and is on track for the Gr 1 Jonsson Workwear Garden Province Stakes on Vodacom Durban July day.

Crawford said about the strongly built Maybe Yes, ”She is fine, doing well and working well, we’re very happy with her. ”

Maybe Yes relaxed well after being taken to the front from a wide draw in that last race over 1400m and found just as good a kick in the straight as she did when winning the Gr 2 KRA Fillies Guineas last season.

She has plenty of class and a fine turn of foot and 1400m could well be her best trip, considering her tendency to want to get on with it in the early stages.

A point worth noting is that she appeared to be sweating on the way to the start last time out but that had no effect on her performance.

Champion jockey S’Manga Khumalo will ride Mabe Yes for the third time in succession.

By David Thiselton

Mike Robinson, a training sensation 12 months ago but relatively quiet this term, can strike with Imperial Guard in the Soccer 6 Maiden at Kenilworth tomorrow.

The Philippi trainer had only a tiny string last season and his horses totalled just 51 runs. Yet he won 12 races – a strike rate of 23% – and scored notable victories with Hot Affair and Blarney Bay who he improved out of all recognition.

His reward was a shopping list for yearlings a mile long, and he ended up with more than 30 of them – “83% of my string are two-year-olds,” he says explaining the yard’s change of fortunes this season – just four winners and the strike rate down to 3%. “But Blarney is coming back and I will nominate him [on Wednesday] for a race later this month.”

Robinson is understandably optimistic that Imperial Guard will oblige tomorrow. Karl Neisius’s mount is as short as 6-10 in the Betting World forecast and has repeatedly gone close. “He has been a bit unlucky,” says his trainer. “The softer ground should help. He is a very sound horse but I think he will enjoy the sting out of the ground and I believe I have found the right race for him.”

Justin Snaith has had at least one two-year-old success at each of the last four Cape Town meetings and Star Express ran on like a certain future winner after starting slowly on debut.

“We thought it might be a bit short for her but we were expecting her to run well,” Snaith recalls. “She is a nice little filly and she is all heart.”

The champion trainer believes the change in the going will be in her favour, adding: “My horses are crying out for the soft ground. It was a long summer, too long.”

The one doubt about Star Express – forecast 2-1 favourite -is that her first run was in what now looks a weakish race and therefore 4-1 chance Sails Set gets preference, particularly at the price. Speedball, considered good enough to run in the Perfect Promise, also comes into consideration at 4-1.

Brett Crawford, trainer of Sails Set, may also win the next on the card with 5-1 shot Beyond Limits even though stable jockey Cone Orffer is on newcomer Nebula (4-1) and Snaith’s Overshadow is 5-2 forecast favourite

What Fun, whose saddle slipped in her last race, has the form to win the Cape Town Winter Maiden but punters should note that she missed a subsequent race because of an infection and has been on antibiotics. Sometimes horses run a bit flat after that.

“I put her on them straightaway and I went easy with her,” says Adam Marcus who is confident that she will be fine. “She has come out of it well and she looks fresh and well.”

Even so, Caprice Des Dieux is put forward as an alternative. Marcus’s Charlie Strong (3-1) found 1 400m too short last month and tries a mile in the last but 2-1 favourite Storm Faerie is the pick on form.

By Michael Clower

Picture: Mike Robinson

It is seven years since a Gr 1 Rising Sun Gold Challenge winner went on to win the Vodacom Durban July, but the double could possibly be done again this year as the ruling favourite for the country’s biggest horseracing event, Futura, will be lining up in the Gold Challenge at Greyville on Saturday.

However, this will be the Justin Snaith-trained superstar’s return bout with his new stablemate Legislate, having stolen the latter’s limelight when winning the Gr 1 L’Ormarin’s Queen’s Plate in early January.

Snaith said about Saturday’s big clash, “Futura has come on lengths from his last run and has put up a very good gallop on the Summerveld grass since. He couldn’t be better and I’m very happy. He’s a very nice natured horse and is a pleasure to train. Legislate also galloped on the grass at Summerveld on Monday. He was blowing a little bit and that’s what we wanted as we hope he comes on from that. It’s hard to be sure whether he will be back to his best, but he’s doing well enough and he likes to run fresh. They are both well and I wouldn’t want to change anything.”

Legislate was thought to be virtually unbeatable in the Queen’s Plate, having broken the Kenilworth 1600m Old Course record when winning the Gr 2 Green Point Stakes in his seasonal reappearance. However, he finished stone last and was subsequently found to have serious lung infection, so has not been seen out again since.

Meanwhile, Futura, still conditioned at that stage by his original trainer Brett Crawford, stamped himself as the best horse in the country by winning the J&B Met.

Later, in one of the shocks of the season, the three-time Gr 1 winning  Dynasty colt left the Crawford yard due to a dispute among the ownership syndicate and joined Snaith.

Crawford had also nurtured Futura to a win in the Gr 1 Champions Cup over 1800m at Greyville in his final start as a three-year-old and that was after some had felt he had been unlucky in the July, having been caught in behind a slow pace.

Futura has everything a top class racehorse needs from a laid back temperament, the ability to relax in the running, a fantastic turn of foot as well as plenty of speed but also the stamina to stay the 2200m of the July. Furthermore, he announced his well-being on May 17 by winning his Champions Season pipe opener over 1600m at Greyville in cosy fashion under his new jockey Sean Cormack.

Legislate, who is also a four-year-old colt by Dynasty, has proved he has all of those credentials himself, having won all of the Gr 1 Investec Cape Derby, the Gr 2 KRA Guineas, the Gr 1 Daily News 2000 and the July last year. The latter three wins proved his liking for Greyville. He won the July last year only after a controversial objection, but he was deservedly named Equus Horse Of The Year. His class, exemplified by his tremendous turn of foot, was then seen at its maximum in the Green Point, where he put up a truly world class performance.

However, the Queen’s Plate run put a dampener on his future. Furthermore, in his intended comeback recently, in the IOS Drill Hall Stakes, he had to be scratched  after kicking the pens. This misfortune and the subsequent trip from the start back to the parade ring apparently took a lot out of him and a couple of days later the Snaith yard declared him a doubtful runner in the July. Snaith said over the weekend that his July participation was still up in the air and advised punters to keep their ante-post betting money in their pockets for now.

The International Federation of Horseracing Authorities had the Gold Challenge as the only South African horseracing event in its world 100 top races recently. The ratings are calculated by averaging the merit of the first four finishers as accorded by the Longines Worlds Best Racehorse Rankings.

Snaith in fact trained the last horse to do the Gold Challenge-July double in the same season. In 2008 his superstar grey filly Dancer’s Daughter quickened superbly off a slow pace to win the Gold Challenge at Clairwood under Weichong Marwing and then ran on strongly under Kevin Shea to dead-heat with the great Pocket Power in one of the most exciting July’s of all time.

Saturday will tell whether Legislate is the same horse he was before the Queen’s Plate. If he is this clash of the Snaith-trained titans could well be the highlight of the season, although it is by no means a two horse race.

By David Thiselton

Picture: Futura (Nkosi Hlophe)