All the recent rain in Cape Town is frustrating Eric Sands as he prepares his unbeaten Winter Guineas and Winter Classic winner Rainbow Bridge for a return to the fray.

Rainbow Bridge (Liesl King)

The Milnerton trainer said yesterday: “The horse is doing well and I think giving him the break was one of the best things we have ever done for him. He was supposed to gallop at Durbanville on Thursday but the gallops have been cancelled because of the rain.

“He may go in the 1 200m (Pinnacle) at Durbanville on Saturday week but I don’t want to race him in that if they are going to run him off his feet, and I don’t want to gallop him too close to the race.”

Sands has long had the Matchem at Durbanville on October 6 as the first feature target of the season for the four-year-old whose objectives, all going well, will be the L’Ormarins Queen’s Plate and the Sun Met.

Stable companion Silver Plains, the mount of Anton Marcus, has been opened at 6-1 for his debut in the Perpetua House Maiden at Kenilworth on Saturday. World Sports Betting makes the Candice Bass-Robinson newcomer Sovereign Spirit a warm favourite at 2-1. Master Of Spain, 18-10 in the finale, is the only favourite among Marcus’s six mounts.

By Michael Clower