Mr Flood and Mardi Gras clash in honour of Senor Santa

The main event at Turffontein on Saturday is named after Senor Santa, who raced in the 1980s and 1990s in the colours of Fred and Harold Cawdry and was trained in KwaZulu-Natal by Tony Rivalland and Willie Pieters.

This weekend’s race is a 1160m straight dash and has attracted a decent entry of tough speedsters, with tightly grouped betting odds telling of the competitiveness.

A record of seven Grade 1 victories at distances from 1000m to 1600m attests to the legend Senor Santa. He competed and won from age two to eight, amassing 15 victories and two Champion Sprinter titles – in 1989 and 1990 – and becoming the first sprinter to top R1 million in prize money.

Senor Santa was a son of Summerhill Stud’s great sire Northern Guest and was out of Boland Stud’s prodigious mare Mexican Charm.

Sprinters can be fiery, but Senor Santa was known as the most even-tempered of horses – which probably contributed to his relaxed style of racing, never getting flustered at the start and saving all his resources for a devastating turn-of-foot in the rush to the line.

Boland Stud’s Dr Frank Freeman remembered the champion’s laid-back nature: “He had an amazing temperament. When I would go down to the stables at night and turned on the lights, all the yearling would get up, but Senor Santa just continued sleeping!

“When trucked from Durban to Joburg to raid he would get in and go lie down and sleep all the way there. And he would do the same all the way back home.”

Summerhill boss Mick Goss, who took in the gelding after his retirement from racing as a “babysister” for weanlings, described him as, “The best racing son of the best stallion ever to stand here. He was one of the nice guys of racing.”

Senor Santa died in 2014 at the ripe old age of 29.

The Joburg racing crowd are hoping the weather forecasters have got their sums right for Saturday.

Apart from a natural desire to see good sprinters going toe-to-toe in the Senor Santa Stakes, the racing game is not in the best of health and needs a sunny day and the tonic of solid betting afternoon to restore spirits.

With a muddy track seeing Thursday’s fixture at the Vaal called off and who-knows-what calamities lying ahead when the coronavirus hits South Africa in earnest, operator Phumelela will be thankful for the prediction of sunny weather and a gentle breeze to dry out the Turfies turf after days of drenching.

The inappropriately named Mr Flood, trained by Lucky Houdalakis and ridden by Marco van Rensburg is aiming for six wins on the trot as he lines up for the R350,000 Grade 2 contest.

The four-year-old son of Pathfork has been sparingly raced and was highly thought of as a juvenile, being pitched straight into the SA Nursery on debut.

An injury setback after his first two wins saw him out of action for more than a year, but he bounced back with a stunning victory in last December’s Lebelo Sprint.

Mr Flood is quoted at 2-1 to smash a six in the Senor Santa.

Sean Tarry-trained Mardi Gras has earned his merit rating of 124 with seven wins. The striking grey hasn’t stepped out since winning the Merchants at Turffontein 105 days ago, but he won that fresh after a six-month break so is the obvious main threat to Mr Flood.

Rivarine, Rebel’s Champ and Mighty High are all horses that much was expected of when they were younger – before life got in the way – and could easily regain their earlier spark.

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