Punters got a raw deal as rank outsiders ruled the final day at Mahalaxmi. Only two favourites obliged in the eight event card. "Start-to-finish" was the order of the day. Six out of the eight races were won in this fashion.
The day began with a shock win of Te Quiero who was partnered by V Chandrakant, a jockey whose win percentage is even more shocking. Hitting the front soon on start, Te Quiero got better in the straight and sped ahead of Sharapova and Raging Chenb. Black Hussar, the favourite, gave chase and for a moment looked like making a race of it. However, Te Quiero was only getting stronger at the finish and Black Hussar just could not measure up to the task. Te Quiero won well with a little to spare giving Chandrakant his first win for the season.
Solskjaer (Parvesh) had cornered a lot of support and was the first favourite. Classic Spirit took up the running followed by Lady Trooper, Acceptance and Flying Rock; close behind was Solskjaer in fifth. Mustang Sally lost all his chances by running wide all through. In the straight, Classic Spirit (Belose) had a handy 3-length lead but approaching the distance post, Solskjaer quickened readily and shaped like a winner. Once in the lead, the public fancy was looking good and safe from any threat. Solskjaer went to score a comfortable victory with Zuetina (Merchant) coming in nicely to beat Classic Spirit for the runner-up slot.
Covenant and King's Desire were expected to fight for the third race. Generalissimo and See The Truth had their share of support as well. Beyond Therapy (Ranjane) was practically friendless. His isolation in the betting ring did not dampen the spirit of the mare and she readily hit the front and stayed on making mockery of all the calculations to produce the biggest upset of the day. The grey mare under trainer Antia's charge surprised her more fancied stablemates and clocked a breezy 58.91 seconds for the 5-furlong scurry. Covenant (Kharadi) tried hard to catch up but failed to sustain and had the displeasure of surrendering the second spot to King's Desire on the post. The other two were completely outpaced.
Procyon was another popular choice who went down without any show. Mysterious Star (Aadesh), who was knocking on the doors for a while, chose the last day to gallop. Leading from the start, Mysterious Star overcame a horde of challengers to win a hard-fought battle. On straightening up, the first pressure came in from the Procyon who faded away quickly. Then past the 400 metres, Morpheus came along side and tested the leader who wrested back the issue. The strongest challenge came at the distance post from Spiritual Flame (Chouhan) which lasted till the end and Mysterious Star really had to stretch himself to barely hold on at the all important end. Spiritual Star will rue the fact that she was kept at the rear end for the most part and had to move on the outside in the straight.
Romantic Impact (Nirmal) brought some sanity back. The 7/10 on favourite marched ahead soon on start and galloped away in the final stages to post an impressive victory. Maintaining a slender lead all the way, Romantic Impact was joined by Highland Flame as they turned for home. However, past the 400 m, Romantic Impact started to break away and once Highland Flame gave up, there was no other danger in sight. Zen came up but was not good enough for the favourite and Wild Tooornaado was finishing on for the place money. John Cabot came from a long way back to figure in the frame.
Dancing Dynamite was the most impressive winner of the day and clinched the SBC Million (the feature event of the day) with supreme authority. The impressive looking dark bay gelding, owned by VN Babu, settled in fourth hugging the rails behind Fire Within, Bella and Es Sider. Fire Within brought the field homeward and Bella was in close attendance as Dancing Dynamite came alongside the pair ready to explode. Past the 400 m, Dancing Dynamite shifted to top gear and jockey PS Chouhan found his charge in a fiery galloping mood. The Mansoor Shah trainee produced a brilliant final run to demolish the opposition with surprising ease to win with a comfortable margin in exactly a minute and 25 seconds. Ascriptive was a good second nearly five lengths away, but he covered a lot of ground to finish ahead of Rising Hero. Giannatossio, the most favoured to win, ended a poor fourth.
Elementto Angel was the fifth horse out of six in the day to win the race from the word 'go'. Just like Mysterious Star, the Nana Raghunath ward had to fight his way warding off many challengers. Soon on turn, Sparta put up a spirited challenge after Lightening Bolt weakened, and the two tussled for quite a while in the straight. In the final furlong, Sparta found it hard and the new and most fierce challenge came from Premier Queen who came up with a strong finishing effort. However, Elementto Angel stood out and coped bravely to hold on by a mere half length. Premier Queen will make an impact in Pune early.
Ptolemy was another huge let down for the punters. Going by the trend of the day, Socaroro too attempted a start-to-finish and was successful. Hitting the front, Socaroro got better in the straight and left nothing to chance and opened up a yawning gap to keep any possible threat out of sight. Appu kept increasing the margin in the home stretch and the rest were hopelessly out-paced. Ptolemy found the lead of Socaroro hard to handle and gave up earlier than expected. Full Throttle was too late and the lead was too huge anyway. However, Nadeem Alam did cover a lot of ground to finish second although by a longish margin.
The Champions' Awards were given away by the Chairman of RWITC Dr. Cyrus Poonawalla. Jockey C.Rajendra won the Champion Jockey title again having ridden 36 winners. P. Shroff led in 41 winners to claim the Trainers championship. Dr. MAM Ramaswamy having won stake money of Rs 1,86,94,316 was declared the leading owner and High Groove Stud Racing Syndicate was the leading syndicate. The Poonawalla Stud Farms were the leading Stud Farms with 134 winners. Jockey Kishore Kadam was the champion apprentice with 14 winners edging out the promising Nadeem Alam by a solitary victory. Bookmakers Mayur and Latif Associates were the leading bookmakers for Mumbai and Pune respectively.
