The jockeys' weighing room at Mahalaxmi easily became the noisiest place in Mumabi yesterday evening when all senior, junior and apprentice Indian jockeys shouted their lungs out, egging on their team's captain B Prakash who rode Visionaire in the eighth race.
The jockeys' weighing room at Mahalaxmi easily became the noisiest place in Mumabi yesterday evening when all senior, junior and apprentice Indian jockeys shouted their lungs out, egging on their team's captain B Prakash who rode Visionaire in the eighth race.
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Forest Flair with B Prakash (outside) gets the better of Sea Ruler, (M Fenton up) in the middle, and Portrush (Dasrath Singh up) on the inner rails to win the Dr S C Jain Sprinters Championship (Gr II) at the
Mahalaxmi racecourse yesterday |
To their great relief, the captain extracted astounding acceleration from his mount and won the race. The victory ensured a respectable show by the Indian boys despite losing the championship, against foreign riders' brigade who won the 'Clash Of The Titans' championship under jockey NG McCullagh's leadership.u00a0
"This is a great contest, I think it should be held every year," McCullagh had said before the race, "the boys are all charged up, and we will go all out to win."
McCullagh led from the front as he himself won two races out of the five earmarked for the championship, and was a strong candidate for the prize of the silver whip going into the last and final leg of the contest. However, skipper of the Indian contingent B Prakash gave an inspired ride to Visionaire to emerge victorious, and bagged the silver whip with the highest individual score of 48 points.
B Prakash had earlier won the feature race of the day, the Dr S C Jain Sprinters Championship (Grade 2) astride Forest Flair on whom he had to really work hard to prevail by half a length from Sea Ruler (M Fenton up).
The other big race on yesterday's card, the Byramjee Jeejeebhoy Eclipse Stakes of India (Grade 2), was won by the Poonawalla family's Icebreaker (D Allan up), saddled by trainer S Padmanabhan. The professional honours for the day were shared by trainers Pesi Shroff and Cooji Katrak who saddled a brace each, while among riders it was B Prakash, the winner of the silver whip, who rode three winners on the nine-race card.
