KINGSTON, Jamaica - SEVENTY-THREE declarations, which with late non-starters was reduced to 70, is another reminder of the challenge encountered by the SVREL racing office to fill the race cards, with the breeding industry in actual decline year over year for more than a decade and a half.
The eighth and feature event on the nine-race card was another renewal of the 1000-metre straight Charles Hussey Trophy to honour one of Jamaica’s true all-time great reinsmen who made winning over today’s course and distance his speciality. Hussey was champion in 1976 and 1977 before departing to ride successfully in the USA and amass 476 wins totalling US$4.30 million in stakes earnings. When he resumed riding locally he added the 1998 and 2001 titles to his achievements in a career that yielded 1241 Caymanas Park winners, which included victories in all the Classics and most major races.
A field of seven reported to the starter, with former Classic hopeful Emperorofthecats — third in Jamaica St Leger — having prepared impressively and going off as the 4-5 favourite.
Always sharing the lead, Shane Ellis, with the requisite skill and balance, got the appropriate response inside the last 200 metres to secure victory by a length for conditioner Carl Anderson, who also bred the gelding.
Post time of the opening event was delayed, allowing those in attendance to view the latter stages of the FIFA 2022 World Cup on the big screen. Following a 3-3 regular and extra time deadlock, Argentina won by way of a 4-2 superiority in kicks from the penalty spot.
Favourite Storm Valley (4-5), owned and saddled by Joseph Thomas, won the event with champion Anthony Thomas at the reins in a near-nine-length romp for the first of two riding successes on the day.
Race two, run at 1300 metres, was won by 4-1 chance Duke Of Springs (USA) — ridden by Phillip Parchment for trainer Tensang Chung — while the third, a Maiden Special Weight restricted to juveniles and run over 1300 metres, was an opportunity for a near nine-length win margin for 4-5 favourite Anonymous (Reyan Lewis) who was schooled by outgoing three-time champion Anthony Nunes.
Bet at odds of 5-1 Denbigh Life, saddled by Donovan Plummer and ridden by Devon A Thomas, was seven and three parts of a length better than her nearest rival over the straight 1000 metres of race four. For his second win of the card Thomas was not required to do more than the basics for Philip Feanny’s Power (1-5) to be the fourth wide-margin winner of the afternoon, coasting in by eight and a half lengths.
The sixth event, Division 01 of the 800-metre Restricted Three-Year-Olds’ Maiden Condition, was won by lightly raced Special Gift (3-1), piloted by Shavon Townsend for conditioner Ray Phillips. In race seven, run as Division 02, title-chasing and leading reinsman Dane Dawkins, starting the day on 94 winners, saw it reduced by Thomas’s two-timer moving that chief-rival-pursuing-tally to 92, but pulled one back aboard Patrick Lynch’s Keturah (6-5).
Looking for his first championship and with four race meetings remaining in the 2022 season, Dawkins restored his four-win advantage by guiding the Richard Azan-trained Whisky (7-2) to victory in the 1200-metre nightcap for non-winners of two races to equal Thomas’s feat.
The Training Feat Award is presented to Donovan Plummer for the presentation of Denbigh Life, who had shown no preference for the 1000-metre straight course but performed exceptionally well. Emperorofthecats executed the Best Winning Gallop and Shane Ellis’s invaluable assistance provided to the gelding earns the Jockeyship Award.
