Devin Heffer fittingly led in two winners at Hollywoodbets Greyville on Saturday, including the Hollywood Racing-owned MJ Odendaal-trained Flower Alley gelding Tobacconist, who won the last race on the opening day of the 2025 Champions Season.
Hollywoodbets’ Devin Heffer – exciting times ahead (Pic – Candiese Lenferna)
The rejuvenation of KZN Racing is leaving no stone unturned and Hollywood Racing also now have their own training centre at Ashburton.
Speaking to Turf Talk, Devin agreed it was one of the most momentous days in Hollywoodbets history on Saturday at Hollywoodbets Greyville, the first meeting since Hollywood have taken over KZN racing and it was the opening day of Champions Season to boot.
Devin said, “We were talking about it earlier in the week, how special it was and how the whole thing has come full circle. When we became sponsors of the racecourses, that was really special, and sponsoring the July was immense, but this is the start of a whole new era, it is a whole new journey for us.”
He continued, “I’m just very proud of Owen and the whole Hollywood family. But, it’s not all congratulations now. We’ve got a big task ahead of us, but we’ve hit the ground running.”
He spoke about the changes that have been made and those still to come, saying, “The changes have obviously started already, there’s the new LED floodlights, the rejuvenation of the polytrack, the upgrade of the parade ring with the new gazebo, the lead in area, the upgrade of the second third and fourth boxes, different camera angles, the upgrade of the LED screen on the big screen and then there’s the upgrade of the Durban View Room, which is looking amazing, the hospitality rooms are being redone too. All the lavatories and the bathroom facilities are being redone, they’ve been gutted and rejuvenated.”
That is not to mention the redoing of the grandstand roof, which was no small task.
He continued, “A lot of the stuff we tried to get done in the last few months, we don’t want to disrupt Champions Season too much, and that was obviously a leap of faith as the agreement had not yet been approved.”
He added, “But there’s a lot going on, a lot still being done, and after Champions’ season there’s a whole lot more projects that still need to be done.”
He said, “Obviously there’s a lot being done at the other centres, such as Hollywoodbets Scottsville and Summerveld. There’s already a lot of work being done there, a lot of projects are underway there, especially Summerveld, which is going to be massive. There is the upgrading of the facilities, the roads, the walkways, the Groom’s accommodation, the stabling. We really want to make it into the world class facility it needs to be.”
At the moment the brand name for the new operator is RaceCoast, which is the same name that is currently being used for the KZN racing incentive scheme, but the final decision on the name will be made this month and a launch will then be done.
Devin Heffer and Anthony Delpech lead Tobacconist (Sean Veale) in after his win in the final race on Saturday (Pic – Candiese Lenferna)
Greg Bortz, who was behind the rejuvenation of Cape Racing in partnership with Hollywoodbets and who has also been instrumental in the take over of KZN racing, is one of the new directors. He was being called the chairman designate from the onset of the take over bid, but that has not yet happened and Devin did speak of how supportive Gold Circle chairman Sadha Naidoo had been of the new era’s vision and of the changes made to date.
Meanwhile, Hollywood actually have a training centre for their own horses on the site of the old Ashburton training centre.
Devin revealed, “It was mothballed a few years ago, mainly during Covid, and we started work on it a little under two years ago. Mainly, it started as a life-after-racing barn for our retired horses, then it became our own pre-training and spelling facility for which we had another barn and now we’ve got our own training facility there with Trevor Brown taking out his license and doing our training from there. We have already rejuvenated five of the barns. It’s been amazing. It’s really looking like a world-class facility at the moment. We’re still learning a lot though. We’re having to take our medicine in a lot of ways, but we’re getting a lot of support from the industry. A lot of people are giving us a helping hand and directing us in the right way.”
He added, “But just from Nicole (Wille) for life-after-racing, and Trevor and Jo Brown for the pre-training, and now Trevor doing his own training and obviously Anthony (Delpech) and all his input and the whole team there … It’s really looking good. The tracks have also been redone and the sand has been rejuvenated.”
He said about Trevor Brown, “Trevor’s going to play a big role for us. He’s got decades of experience working with world-class trainers, especially Mike de Kock. Mike’s been a great guardian for us and guiding us and pushing us in the right direction and obviously Mike and Anthony’s relationship goes a long way back, so I think in that instance Trevor’s going to play a big role for us.”
It is exciting times for KZN racing fans, who have the reputation of being the most knowledgeable and passionate in the country.
It is also exciting times for industrymen in the Garden Province as the new era begins and it was fitting that KZN’s trainers, jockeys and owners, including Hollywood Racing and Devin himself, were so prominent in the results on Saturday.
