Million dollar ‘bonus’ on offer to lucky owner

One lucky owner could walk away from Saturday’s Sun Met day at Kenilworth Racecourse in Cape Town with a cheque for the rand equivalent of a cool US$1.5 million in his pocket.

Cape Thoroughbred Sales (CTS) are paying a $1-million bonus if the same owner wins both the $500,000 CTS Sprint and the $500,000 CTS Mile.

The ownership of the two winning horses must be the same; if one of the two has a different part-owner the bonus will not be paid. Indeed only three owners actually qualify – Hassen Adams, David Shawe and Markus and Ingrid Jooste, who now race most of their horses in the name of Mayfair Speculators.

Mayfair has an exceptionally strong hand with six of the 20 runners in the Sprint including several of the highest merit-rated and second favourite Always In Charge.

In the Mile Mayfair has five of the 16 runners including 12-10 favourite William Longsword.

Adams has Red Light Girl (66-1) in the Sprint and Primrose Lane (40-1) in the Mile. Shawe’s Al Danza is a 25-1 chance in the Sprint but his Singapore Sling has been backed from 12-1 to 8-1 in the Mile.

Over and above the bonus the owner will receive stake money of $250,000 for winning each race.

There are 13 races on the day which will include the R5-million Sun Met celebrated with Mumm, and four other R1-million races. There has been further betting support for three-year-old colt Gold Standard, who is now on offer at 7-1 from 8-1.

There has also been a change of ownership just ahead of the big race with Chrigor Stud (Pty) Ltd selling a large share of the horse to Gaynor Rupert’s Drakenstein Stud. The horse will now run in the Drakenstein colours of blue, with a white square, blue sleeves and cap.

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