Watch out when Green With Envy catches a wake-up

When Dean Kannemeyer saddled up and sent out Green With Envy for the juvenile’s first race last year, the trainer thought to himself, “Just don’t embarrass me!”.

He knew the well-bred colt had plenty of potential, but the youngster had been a bit on the dopey side around the yard.

“Well, he duly won that race. Now, a year later, he’s favourite for the Durban July,” observed Kannemeyer in a Gallop TV interview this week.

Red-hot favourite

Before Green With Envy tackles Africa’s biggest horse race, he has an appointment at Greyville racecourse in Saturday’s Daily News 2000 – one of South Africa’s premier races for three-year-olds and a major pointer to the July.

Not only is he favourite for that race, too, he is a red-hot 6-10.

Asked how he rates the son of champion sire Gimmethegreenlight, amiable Kannemeyer simply murmurs: “He’s going about things the right way.”

Going through the motions

The Cape Town-based trainer explains that the “progressive” colt shows very little in his gallops back home. “He just goes through the motions. You could see that the other day when he won at Greyville (in the WSB Guineas), he goes to sleep during a race as well.”

Of course, Green With Envy did eventually rouse himself from his mid-race torpor that day, streaking past the top-rated opposition, relegating odds-on favourite Sandringham Summit to runner-up, and shooting to the top of the July betting boards.

Green With Envy has won five of his nine starts, the last three on the trot.

Kannemeyer says: “You can see that, physically, he is only now starting to do it. He has a deep girth and a lovely shoulder.”

It’s such a lovely shoulder that a sparse eight of his contemporaries are taking on the challenge of trying to beat him over Durban’s downtown 2000m.

Support for Hluhluwe

Second favourite for the Daily News is Hluhluwe, trained by Justin Snaith, for whom there is quiet support at 6-1.

All nine runners are entered for the Hollywoodbets Durban July six weeks down the line, with some assured of a starting slot and others knocking on the door to get in.

The betting trend for Saturday’s accompanying Grade 1 feature, the Tabgold Woolavington 2000, a weight-for-age contest for females, contrasts sharply. Here there are three 3-1 co-favourites: three-year-olds Frances Ethel and Silver Sanctuary, and four-year-old Saartjie.

All three are July hopefuls and it promises to be a battle of note.

Selections

Race 6 (Woolavington): 1 Silver Sanctuary, 2 Frances Ethel, 6 Saartjie, 7 Gilded Butterfly

Race 7 (Daily News): 5 Green With Envy, 6 Hluhluwe, 4 Mid Winter Wind, 3 Pure Predator