Display Model – 1992 Gr2 Majorca Stakes winner
The eighth race on the Sun Met programme is the R1 million Gr1 Majorca Stakes, one of the most important weight-for-age races for fillies and mares on the racing calendar. The race will be sponsored for the eighth year by leading breeders, Klawervlei Stud, an institution with close ties to the race.
1993 Majorca Stakes – Star Award wins
From an historical perspective, it is fitting that Klawervlei sponsor the race since it is named after the champion filly Majorca who was bred at Klawervlei by Ralph Koster.
Legendary trainer Terrance Millard won the Majorca seven times, and interestingly, also celebrated a double. That was with the Peacable Kingdom filly Fast Piece who won the race in 1976 and 1977.
Millard’s first winner was Kentucky Belle in 1972 and he rounded off a golden era with Olympic Duel in 1990.
Terrance Millard
The last filly to achieve a double was The D Cohen & Sons bred Fine Edge filly Donatella, who won the race in 1999 and 2000, for trainer Clodagh Shaw. There is no double bid in the 2018 renewal as last year’s winner Nightingale lines up in the Sun Met.
The unique Paddock Stakes – Majorca double also won’t be in danger as Justin Snaith has gone the Met route with his recent runaway Paddock Stakes winner, Oh Susanna.
The brilliant Equus champion Beach Beauty, now retired at Drakenstein Stud, and whose first foal, a colt by Trippi, was snapped up for R2,5 million by John Freeman at last weekend’s big sale, is probably the most celebrated of recent winners, and like Inara in 2016, won the Paddock Stakes – Majorca double.
And memories go back to 1997, when just one week after Koster Bros-bred London News captured the J&B Met, another product of their Cheveley Stud came to light when Roman Fantasy scrambled home a narrow winner of the Majorca Stakes.
