Merit rating changes ring after Sun Met

Following careful analysis by Handicappers Lennon Maharaj, Ma hew Lips and Vee Moodley, RAINBOW BRIDGE has seen an increase in his merit rating from 119 to 124 following his triumph in the Grade 1 Sun Met celebrated with G.H.MUMM at Kenilworth on Saturday.

It was unanimously agreed among the handicapping panel that the correct line horse to use as a means of rating the Sun Met was fourth-placed UNDERCOVER AGENT.

While he was trying the distance of 2000m for the first time, it was noted that UNDER-COVER AGENT and fifth- placed LEGAL EAGLE finished virtually alongside each other for the third time in succession, having done so too in the Green Point Stakes and later in the L’Ormarins Queen’s Plate.

This remarkable consist-ency shown by both horses at the highest level led to the strong conclusion that UNDERCOVER AGENT would not have run below his best in the Sun Met and that he is therefore a logical choice of line horse.

Thus, RAINBOW BRIDGE is now rated 124, while runner-up DO IT AGAIN (who was second last at the 400m mark) remains a 125 despite this defeat, based on his impressive Queen’s Plate win.

HEAD HONCHO, who made a brave attempt to win the Met with pillar-to-post tactics, is now rated 122, up from his pre-Met rating of 114. He has clearly more than confirmed the promise he showed when a runaway winner of the Grade 2 Premier Trophy in December.

In rating HEAD HONCHO 122, the handicappers took into account that he had over-raced for much of the 2 000m distance and that he had hung out visibly on the bend, so it is believed to have been a run full of merit and worthy of a 122 rating, LEGAL EAGLE’s rating has been dropped from 121 to 120, which is his season’s best mark, achieved when winning the Green Point Stakes.

In other changes, TAP O’ NOTH’s rating drops from 112 to 110, 2018 Sun Met winner OH SUSANNA’s rating has been trimmed from 121 to 119, and HAT PUNTANO drops to 106 from 109.

Be ing World Cape Flying ChampionshipKASIMIR’s rating was upped from 111 to 117 a er he comfort-ably landed the day’s fi rst Grade 1 event, the Cape Flying Champi-onship over 1000m.

Here, fi h-placed TRIP TO HEAVEN was used as the line horse.

TRIP TO HEAV-EN has consistently shown a simi-lar level of form in major sprint races all around South Africa for a number of years, and it is reason-able to believe that he once again ran his usual race here.

KASIMIR has been clearly pro-gressive in Cape Town this season and was able to win despite meet-ing several horses on less favour-able weight terms than in several recent encounters.

This was cer-tainly a career-best eff ort, and a 3kg raise in his rating refl ects that. Runner-up BOLD RESPECT, who was comfortably beaten by KASIMIR again despite meeting that rival on 6.5 kg be er terms for a 2.75-length beating in the Grade 2 Merchants at Kenilworth last November, has been dropped from 118 to 116 to have him rated below KASIMIR.

Third-placed SEARCH PARTY goes up from 106 to 112, while fourth fi nisher PACIFIC TRADER also goes to 112 from a pre-race mark of 110.

In other changes, ATTENBOROUGH was dropped from 112 to 110, 2018 Cape Fly-ing Championship winner SER-GEANT HARDY drops from 115 to 112 on the back of numerous below-par eff orts, DUTCH PHILIP was trimmed from 107 to 106, and ROCKY VALLEY goes to 99 from 101.

G-Bets Cape Derby ATYAAB saw his rating climb from 92 to 109 a er he won the G-Bets Cape Derby. Here, the Handi-cappers were of the opinion that third-placed HERODOTUS would not have run worse than when he fi nished fourth in the Grade 2 Concord Cup won by ONE WORLD last November and used that as a key to rate the Derby. In rating the Derby this way, fi h-placed HEL-EN’S IDEAL runs to the same level of 98 she achieved when she fi n-ished seventh in the Cape Fillies Guineas behind FRONT AND CEN-TRE in December.

There is thus a very neat correlation between the form behind top colt ONE WORLD and top fi lly FRONT AND CENTRE, and ATYAAB is clearly a progres-sive colt whose rating is befi ing of a Grade 1 winner.

Derby runner-up CHARLES was raised from a rating of 94 to 108, while line horse HERODO-TUS now has a rating of 105, which is refl ective of his ability and is not subject to the Handicapping guidelines which prevented his rating from being increased to what he actually achieved in the Concord Cup. Derby fourth-placed BUNKER HUNT has had his rat-ing upped from 93 to 104.

The only horse whose rating dropped as a result of the Derby is PERPETUAL FLAME, who goes from 84 to 80.

Bidvest Majorca Stakes CLOUDS UNFOLD was raised from a rating of 109 to 115 a er she reversed Cape Fillies Guin-eas form with hitherto unbeaten FRONT AND CENTRE by winning the Bidvest Majorca Stakes.

Here, the Handicappers were of the unanimous opinion that fourth-placed FRESNAYE should be used as the line horse to assess the race, having also fi nished fourth in the Grade 1 Paddock Stakes at her previous start three weeks ear-lier.

In that race FRESNAYE was also beaten by LADY IN BLACK, who beat the line horse again in the Majorca Stakes by fi nishing second.. LADY IN BLACK’s rating remains unchanged on 117.

Third-placed FRONT AND CENTRE has had her rating upped from 110 to 112.In other changes, last year’s Majorca Stakes winner SNOWDANCE was dropped from 114 to 112, and FIORELLA drops from 106 to 104. CTS 1200 and CTS 1600 In conclusion, it is noted that the Handicappers’ assessment was vindicated in both of the day’s other R5-million races when the top-rated horse won each of the CTS sales events, CIRILLO (rated 111) in the 1200m race and ONE WORLD (rated 117) in the 1600m event, where he and runner-up TWIST OF FATE (rated 115) con-fi rmed their ratings perfectly.

These horses thus confi rmed the form they had shown throughout the Cape summer racing season.To take a bet, go to www.ta-bonline.co.zaor www.be ing-world.co.za

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