KHAYA’S HOPE is a special racehorse, and everyone loves him.
That was how assistant trainer Dean Smith described the three-year-old gelding after Khaya’s Hope won the Ibhayi Stakes last Friday on the Fairview track.
If he wasn’t the darling of the Fairview faithful before the Ibhayi Stakes, he definitely is now, after another sensational victory.
Trained by the East Cape champion, Gavin Smith, Khaya’s Hope has now won five races from 11 starts – and was either second or third in his other outings. He is the only horse to win two of the big Fairview races so far this season, the Racehorse Owners Association Stakes and now the Ibhayi Stakes.
Cape Town jockey Keagan de Melo has struck up a good partnership with Khaya’s Hope and has a fair idea what the horse can do against the best in the country.
“The sky’s the limit for this horse,” said De Melo, and it will indeed be very interesting to see what the future plans are for Khaya’s Hope.
In last Friday’s other big race, The Lady’s Bracelet, the five-year-old mare, Red Berry, was a surprise winner. With this win Red Berry made sure she is also in the open race to be crowned as the champion older mare in the province at the end of the season.
Local jockey, Teaque Gould, doesn’t often get the chance to ride the best horses, and he took his opportunity with Red Berry to beat the more fancied runners.
Gould is the reigning champion jockey in Zimbabwe, but last won a big one at Fairview two years ago when he brought Sound Check home in the Fillies Nursery.
It was a very good ride by Gould on Red Berry, and it will be good to see him getting more opportunities with the top horses.
There are some interesting happenings in the trainers’ ranks at Fairview.
One of the characters in South African racing, Hekkie Strydom, has handed in his trainers’ licence. Hekkie turns 80 next Wednesday and has been involved with racing for many years, first as a jockey (qualified in 1964), and then as a trainer and owner in the Eastern Cape.
He has now decided it is time for a well-deserved rest but it is great to still see him at the races. His sons, Piere and Jacques, are still very much involved in racing. Piere is one of the best jockeys South Africa has ever produced, and showed that once again by winning the Cape Derby this past Saturday. Jacques is a trainer at Fairview, and the horses which were in Hekkie’s care have joined his stable.
The other development is that Lunga Gila stepped out his first runners as a trainer at yesterday’s Poly meeting. It has been a long road for Lunga to fulfil his dream of running his own yard and he is ready to make a success of it.
At Friday’s Fairview meeting the three-year-old fillies will take centre stage with the running of the Breeders Guineas. It should be a cracking contest.
