No grand finish to fight for trainers’ title

Tarry led briefly on the biggest racing Saturday of the year in South Africa on 6 July after winning two Grade 1 races, including the R3.5-million Durban July, but when the lights at Greyville were switched off that night, De Kock was back in the lead and he kept his nose in front all the way to the wire.

The Gold Cup meeting at Greyville last Saturday was widely expected to be a decider – R395,912 separated the protagonists and they both had fancied runners in the rich races on offer. Neither trainer had a winner, although several of their horses placed and De Kock’s runners earned R270,800 to Tarry’s R248,600. De Kock’s lead had increased to R452,962 with only two meetings left at which they would saddle runners.

Tarry’s runners at Turffontein on Sunday did much better than his rival’s but even that was not enough to bridge the gap and going into Wednesday’s meeting at Scottsville the race was already won. De Kock ended the season R346,962 ahead of Tarry.

De Kock will be crowned champion trainer at the Equus Award ceremony at Emperors Palace on Wednesday 14 August.

The jockeys’ title has been sewn up for a while and popular Piere Strydom – who Anton Marcus describes as “the best jockey in the country, in my book” – will be the man taking a bow on the stage. He was in the lead virtually from the start of the season and eventually won by 62 winners. Marcus had won the title three years running but missed the last month of the 2012-13 season through injury.
Strydom won the South African Jockeys’ Championship five times from 1990 to 1998. Apart from winning the championship, another notable milestone this season included the 4700th winner of his career on Lady Calumet on 16 February.

The Champion Owners’ trophy will be presented to the country’s biggest racing supporters, Markus and Ingrid Jooste, for the sixth year running. They had 1,240 runners this season and celebrated in the No 1 box 177 times. Horses they own earned R16,473,540 in stakes. Second, with a fraction of their numbers was Tarry’s chief patron, Chris van Niekerk. A total of 401 horses sported his blue and red silks in races and he enjoyed 58 winners. His horses’ earnings for the season amounted to R9,301,500.

Nooresh Juglall was by far the most successful apprentice in 2012-13, while Francis Semela was the champion work rider.
* Statistics determine the “people” awards, with the jockeys’ titles decided on number of winners and the others on stakes earned. The racing season in South Africa runs from 1 August – the date every thoroughbred in the Southern Hemisphere turns a year older – to 31 July.