The Jet Master entire Divine Jet has an excellent opportunity to record his fifth win
The R135 000 In Full Flight Handicap is the supporting feature on the Clairwood Sunday programme. With fourteen capable speedsters going head to head over the 1100m, the race looks wide open with Dean Kannemeyer’s Divine Jet looking overdue to score his fifth win.
ith the news that former KZN trainer David Payne saddled the winner of the Australian Derby last weekend, it is perhaps fitting that we pay tribute to the memory of the greatest ever horse that he trained as a young man in the Durban of the 1970’s.
Royal Sort
Dean Kannemeyer won this race last year with Cape Royal when the event was run at Greyville, and the Milnerton conditioner will be looking to repeat the feat in a race Divine Jet is surely capable of winning. That is if he runs to his better form.
We have said it before, but Kannemeyer describes Divine Jet as the best sprinter he has trained never to win a Gr1 race. The son of Jet Master ran in the 600m Easter Dash at his opening run and moved up menacingly before being outpaced by the superior Var speed trio ahead of him.
The race was won by Dennis Drier’s top filly Schiffer who runs in the Gr1 Computaform Stakes next weekend.Divine Jet appears more focussed in the blinkers, and Karl Neisius travels up to ride him. They will go very close.
Bass Trio
The Mike Bass trio is headed by the Caesour gelding Tevez. He has not run for 12 weeks, but ran an excellent third behind Via Africa in the Cape Flying Championship and could pop up fresh under Anton Marcus. He holds Divine Jet on that run.
The smart Muscatt comes in under sufferance on the handicap and off a 12 week rest, but the son of Victory Moon can run fresh. He ran just under five lengths behind Tevez in the Cape Flying Championship and meets his stablemate on 8kgs better terms.
Castlethorpe is another who comes off a rest. He appeared to recapture some of his older form at his last two starts and has run enough decent races over the sprints to challenge.
Captain’s Innings
Dennis Drier’s Barbosa is a smart son of Captain Al. He beat deadheaters Divine Jet and Muscatt at Kenilworth in January and meets and both of those are better off with him here.
Barbosa’s awful effort in the Cape Flying Championship can be ignored, but he showed a form return last time with a two length second to Contador. He will strip fitter on Sunday.
Chances
Vaughan Marshall and MJ Byleveld team up with the Western Winter gelding The West Is Wide, who returns from a break of 13 weeks following a good win at Kenilworth.
He has proven to be inconsistent in the past. Brett Crawford and Glen Hatt look competitive on joint bottomweight with the consistent 3yo Gulf Storm. Unproven at feature level, the son of Sail From Seattle looks capable of developing into a good sort and has his first run in the province.
Betting
In a race where most could be looking to find their peak fitness in the next run or two, Divine Jet, Tevez and Barbosa look most likely to fight things out. Watch the betting on the lightly raced and unsound Muscatt.
Remembering A Legend: In Full Flight
Owned by Mr N.H. Ferguson, In Full Flight was first seen in action in February 1971 at the Durban Turf Club when he won his maiden plate; during his juvenile season he won four out of his six starts. In his last appearance as a 2-year-old he had a spectacular victory leaving the rest of the field 9½ lengths behind as he passed the post.
As a 3yo, In Full Flight’s remarkable record continued. He was beaten only once in 10 starts – when he ran third to Sentinel and Elevation in the South African Guineas at Greyville. Up to the time that he won the Rothman’s July Handicap (1972) he had won over distances from 1000 metres to 1600 metres but had never competed over a distance further than 1600 metres. His wins included the Summerveld Free Handicap by 1½ lengths from Sentinel, a Sprint Handicap at Pietermaritzburg which he won by 4½ lengths, and the Bull Brand Jockeys’ International. In the latter race, ridden by visiting jockey, F. Toro, he stormed away to win by 5½ lengths, with Elevation, Sentinel and Full Stretch in the placings.
The pinnacle of his career was capturing the July by 1¼ lengths from King’s Guard and Pedlar. Trained by David Payne (who at 24 was the youngest trainer ever to saddle the winner of the race) and ridden by 28-year-old Raymond Rhodes, this must have been the most youthful trio ever to win a Durban July. In Full Flight, by New South Wales out of First Swallow (bred by Godfrey Gird at Maine Chance Farms), won three more races before his untimely death as a 4-year-old.
His final victory was at Kenilworth in the Cape. Starting at 4-6 from the wide draw of No.15, but ably ridden by Raymond Rhodes, he strode to the front of the field to win the 1400 metre Somerset Plate by a length from William Penn who was a head in front of Force Ten.
His last race was the 1973 Benson and Hedges Metropolitan Handicap in which he was defeated by the 14-1 outsider, Messrs D.E. Rogers and W.J. Engelbrecht’s Gold Flame with Major M.J. Wyatt’s Force Ten second.
In Full Flight’s death from a ruptured lung only a few days after the Met was a great loss to racing – had he lived he might have gone on to be one of the best horses ever bred in South Africa. He won 11 feature races, and stakes of R123 620 – a bargain for his owner who had bought him at the 1970 Yearling Sales for only R3500.
