Enigma nails Iron Age on the wire

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The Pesi Shroff-trained Enigma (P S Chouhan up) won the Dr S C Jain Sprinters' Championship (Gr 2), Sunday's feature event at the Mahalaxmi racetrack. The five-year-old bay mare, by Phoenix Tower out of Maisha, carried the silks of Mehernosh H Deboo.

Iron Age (Suraj Narredu up), who jumped smartly to take charge from the word go, brought the small field of five into the homestretch, and at one stage, it looked like he would be able to land the rich purse of the race named after the longest-serving former chairman of the Mumbai race club. But Enigma, goaded by Chouhan, accelerated well in the final furlong to pounce on Iron Age at the wire and gained a half-length verdict. Both Enigma and Iron Age are expected to cross swords three weeks later again, at Chennai, where the best sprinters from all over the country will assemble to contest in the Sprinters' Cup (Gr 1).

The combination of jockey Chouhan, trainer Pesi Shroff and owner Mehernosh H Deboo had also earlier won the Dancing Prances Plate for three-year-old maiden horses when Faith (Admiralty - Peritomoreno) beat her five rivals at the lucrative odds of 8 to 1.

In another sprint, the P D Bolton Trophy for class II horses, Endeavour (Kirtish Bhagat up) trained by Imtiaz Sait asserted his superiority when decisively beating Enid Blyton (Neeraj Rawal up) by three-and-a-half lengths.

The day's most impressive--and also the most shocking--performance was registered by Lord Waver, son of Derby winner Be Safe. The four-year-old simply annihilated his rivals when winning the Yawar Rashid Trophy at the odds of 15 to 1, posting a seven-length victory over his hapless rivals. Lord Waver was trained by Karthik Ganapathy and ridden by Bhawani Singh.