It’s Tony in One Fell Swoop

The Grade 3 Betway Sycamore Sprint for fillies and mares over 1160m tops the card at Turffontein on Saturday and it looks an interesting contest.

Probably the best performed runner is Mrs Browning. Sean Tarry’s charge has been in top form of late and has won three of her last four starts, finishing third on the other occasion behind William Robertson in a Pinnacle Stakes.

This four-year-old daughter of Rafeef loves this course and distance up the Turffontein straight where she has won three of her of her four starts. But she has been lightly raced, having only made 12 visits to the racecourse of which she has won five and placed on another five occasions.

Gavin Lerena will be having his first ride on this filly.

While Mrs Browning is the runner to beat, this is a handicap and that obviously brings others into the race.

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One Fell Swoop is a proven sprinter and this three-year-old Lancaster Bomber filly seems to be getting better with every run. Trained by Tony Peter she has only raced eight times for four wins and two places with her only unplaced runs coming in her first two runs when she was racing in Cape Town before she was transferred up to Peter’s yard on the Highveld.

While she does take a jump in class, One Fell Swoop will carry just 55kg and will be getting 6kg and 5kg from Mrs Browning and Mike de Kock-trained White Pearl respectively.

In addition, a look at times over the course and distance indicates this filly could prove too speedy for her rivals.
Calvin Habib has a record of two wins and a second place when riding this filly and he will be back in the irons once again.

Perhaps the most interesting runner is De Kock’s charge, White Pearl. This three-year-old filly has been campaigning in races between 1400m and 1600m and this will be the first time in her nine starts she will be dropping in distance. This daughter of Danon Platina is certainly no slouch and has been contesting some of the top races for fillies in the country.

Her nine runs have produced two wins, five seconds and two unplaced runs and all of those seconds were in feature races. She was beaten into second by less than a length in all but one those races and in a number of those runs she looked the likely winner only to get caught.

Bringing her back in distance could be the way to go, especially as De Kock has engaged veteran jockey Piere Strydom for the ride.

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There appear to be two good bets to start off the meeting, but neither is likely to go off at generous odds. Mike and Adam Azzie-trained Lets Play Poker received good support on debut last time but found one too good in Shampipi. The Gimmethegreenlight gelding will have come on with the experience and looks hard to oppose in Race 1, this line-up, a Maiden Plate over 1160m.

There are four unraced runners but any of them will have to be pretty good to defeat Lets Play Poker who will have Muzi Yeni in the irons.

A race later the Brett Crawford stable look to hold all the cards when they send out Quick Trip in this Maiden Plate for fillies and mares over 1160m. She has been a little disappointing, but she was just touched off last time by Sea Shanty after looking a winner with 100m to run but this looks a weaker field and she is the best weighted runner by at least 2.5kg. Kabelo Matsunyane takes the ride.