KZN racing season arrives – full of worry and hope

South Africans don’t take much for granted. Living in a mercurial country, we expect the unexpected. Yet some things are such institutions we can’t imagine them not being there – like Christmas and the Durban July.

Shockingly, we find out that the latter might be in jeopardy after 127 years and having gained the reputation of being Africa’s greatest horse race.

The KwaZulu-Natal winter season – dubbed Champions’ Season and universally regarded as consummation of the racing year, with the July itself being the cherry on top – gets underway this weekend with the usual sense of excited anticipation.

The Grade 2 Drill Hall Stakes and Guineas races are time-honoured pipe-openers that this year have attracted fields of exceptional quality.

Dark cloud

But, on the horizon, is a dark cloud – in the form of financial results of Gold Circle, the racing operator in KZN. For the year to the end of July 2023, Gold Circle expects to show a trading deficit of R45 million.

“Gold Circle clearly does not have a sustainable future with the present business model,” was the bald statement. Racing in the province is on its last legs.

But the racing game is nothing if not a monument to hope. Knights in shining armour can already be glimpsed riding to the rescue – in the shape of bookmaking giant Hollywoodbets and hedge-fund fundi Greg Bortz.

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The guys who re-engineered Western Cape racing so impressively have approached the Gold Circle board with a proposal. No details have been made public, but one imagines the Last Outpost rescue strategy will be similar to that employed in the Fairest Cape.

Key elements there were a restructuring of fixtures, boosted prize money, refurbishing of facilities, and incentive schemes galore – and, of course, a capital injection with a very large syringe.

The Gold Circle board will recommend the Hollywood-Bortz proposal to members “at a meeting to be convened in due course”. The knights have a three-month exclusive due diligence period.

In the meantime, Gold Circle plans to keep things running with cash from sometime ring-fenced proceeds of the sale of the Clairwood racecourse property. At the current rate of loss, those funds will run out in 18 months.

Greyville card

As mentioned, racing gallops along on faith and optimism, and Saturday’s Greyville card is where minds will be focused in the immediate future.

The star turn is Charles Dickens, a visitor from Cape Town with six wins and two seconds on his CV. Trainer Candice Bass-Robinson sees the three-year-old’s KZN sojourn taking in Saturday’s WSB Guineas, the Gold
Challenge and the Champion Stakes.

The first leg of that agenda will test the colt’s much-vaunted ability, with fellow Cape visitor Cousin Casey, Highveld raider Anfields Rocket and local hero See It Again looking like stiff opposition.

Both that race and the Drill Hall Stakes are packed with 2023 Hollywoodbets Durban July entrants, so the contest will be fierce to secure a spot in the Big One, which we can only hope won’t be the last one.