Variety Club’s win was a national victory
With tongue firmly planted in cheek, the Chinese Year of the Horse could well soon be rephrased as “The year of the South African horse”. Following on from a commanding Gr2 win on Dubai World Cup night, Variety Club may have delivered South African racing and breeding its biggest win ever yesterday and I’m not referring to the Gr1 Champions Mile. Simon Burgess reports on the potential repercussions of Variety Club’s win.
Local race caller Darren Flindall declared it “A freakish performance” and that “Variety Club was dominant today”, but we all saw it unfold before our eyes, we didn’t need the commentary. The gun ride and humble post race comments by jockey Anton Marcus and the sheer emotion on the faces of Markus Jooste and the normally unflappable Mike De Kock during the South African national anthem told the whole story.
Twitter was alive and going viral post race with one local Hong Kong pundit tweeting, “Watch for news on five purchases from South Africa for Hong Kong. The win of Variety Club WILL be a game changer in the Bloodstock Industry!” But at the end of the day, Mike De Kock summed it up best, saying “South Africa racing has created a tsunami over the past few months with its performances on the world stage, now it’s up to us all to make sure we ride the wave all the way into the beach.”
Without detracting from the kudos Variety Club and his connections so richly deserve for spanking a world class field of milers in their own back yard for the first time ever, there is a sub-plot brewing that will surely be played out this week at the Asian Racing Conference. When Variety Club showed once again just how good the South African breed is, this time the racing world’s administrators and power brokers had a front row seat and it is clear that they got the message. Hong Kong Jockey Club CEO and Olympic Committee representative Winfried Engelbrecht-Bresges summed up the growing sentiment saying, ”I think if there was not already an incentive for the Asian Racing Federation to facilitate a better travel situation for South African horses to the great races of the world, then we saw one today.”
Variety Club cost Markus Jooste R425k (around US$40k) as a yearling, but what the entire son of Var delivered the country’s industry in that one minute thirty-four second cameo performance at Sha Tin on Sunday was priceless, and potentially the much needed catalyst for a solution to the export problem that has been at an impasse for far too long.
