Spit Fire capped a brilliant season on Saturday at the Kennard’s Memorial Turf Club (KMTC) by adding another victory to its resume.
The winner of the Pre Mashramani Sprint Classic in February and the President’s Cup in April won by a nose in the feature C and Lower One Mile event of the KMTC Boxing Day fixture to end 2015 on a high.
For Spit Fire and jockey Colin Ross, this year and the race unravelled in an almost faultless manner.
Ross jumped the Glendon Sooklall (aka Grums) trained steed smartly out of the gates, positioning him on the heels of early pacesetters Lady Budapest, Diplomatic Cat, Keep on Swinging and Goodwill Boy who took the eight-horse field along at a generous gallop.
There he stayed until jockey, Stephen (only name given) on the newly imported Diplomatic Cat made a bold move on the third turn, sweeping up Lady Budapest in the process with Spit Fire close behind
As the three front runners entered the home stretch to a loud roar of the thousands of turfites, it looked as though the race would be a dead heat.
But under a strong Ross drive, the colt was given full rein on the homestretch and used its superior finishing speed to pull away from the rest of the cavalry eventually edging the tireless Lady Budapest in a close finish. Keep on Swinging placed third while a late surge by GoodWill Boy
For the win, Spit Fire, which was imported from North America last year, earned the Shariff Racing Stable the $1M first prize and the champion’s trophy, not bad for less than two minutes of work, one minute and 48 seconds to be exact.
Note: It was back-to-back wins for the Shariff Racing Stables in feature events since the passing of owner Mohamed ‘Nankoo’ Shariff earlier this month. Spit Fire’s stablemate Plum Plum won the marquee event of the Guyana Cup Rematch on December 20.
Prior to the feature event, there were five races. Here is a summary of them:
Race 1
L Class
Royal Stallion ($100,000)
Blue Lightning
Secret Thinker
Mystic
Race 2
H1 and Lower
She So Special ($250,000)
Cat Messiah
Cassie
Mary-Ann
Race 3
E and Lower
Precise Gold ($500,000)
Africanist
Chelsea
Right to Rule
Race 4
K and Lower
Plain Land ($120,000)
Another Storm
Red Region
Affinity
Race 5
J1 and Lower
Party Time ($180,000)
The Girl Is Mine
Affinity
As customary, the KMTC Boxing Day meet brought the curtain down on the current calendar of horse racing activities for the year.
The 2016 season for the ‘Sport of Kings’ starts on January 3 at the Rising Sun Turf Club with an eight-race card. (Emmerson Campbell)
