Alyson Wright
There is a tight race for KZN Trainer’s Championship with all of Alyson, Mike Miller, Gareth van Zyl Wendy Whitehead and Garth Puller within four winners of each other. Alyson and Gareth van Zyl are currently tied on 39 winners each but Alyson’s 44 second places gives her a narrow lead. Alyson was the leading trainer in April with seven winners and with Athandiwe Mgudlwa now part of the stable things are looking up.
Alyson is Gold Circle’s Trainer of the Month for April.
Athandiwe Mgudlwa
Athandiwe, or Thandi to his colleagues, has recently joined forces with Alyson and Kevin Wright. A talented light-weight rider, he does not always get the best opportunities not having been connected to any one stable. But his services are always in demand as he had 43 rides in the month, the third most behind only Richard Fourie and Rachel Venniker. He made the most of those opportunities booting home five winners to take his tally to 36 for the season.
Athandiwe is Gold Circle’s Jockey of the Month for April.
Tienie Prinsloo
Tienie Prinsloo is the only former Kimberley-based trainer to stay the distance when Flamingo Park closed and some moving to KwaZulu-Natal. It has been a struggle and Tienie currently has one of the smallest strings in Summerveld but he saddled eleven runners for three winners and two seconds in the month at a 54% win/place strike rate.
Tienie is Gold Circle’s Trainer of the Month for March
Rachel Venniker
Rachel Venniker is only recently out of her time as an apprentice but lost her apprentice claim over a year before. However, her 1.5kg sex allowance raised eyebrows as she can hold her own against the best, claim or no claim, as she illustrated when winning a Gr1 in Saudi Arabia against some of the finest international riders including regular world number one, Ryan Moore. Rachel was in good form locally as she rode eleven winners at a healthy strike rate of 19%. She also had six seconds and four thirds.
Rachel is Gold Circle’s Jockey of the Month for March.
Wendy Whitehead, Alyson Wright and Gareth van Zyl dominated the leader board as far as winners went in the month and the trio paid to follow with a R1 bet on Wendy’s runner realizing a R11 return on investment. However, veteran Dennis Bosch has scaled down his operation in recent years and only saddled eleven runners in the month. Three of those were winners with three runner-up placings for a 54% winning strike rate.
Dennis is Gold Circle’s trainer of the month for February.
There were a couple of remarkable achievements during the month, notably apprentice James Lihaba riding seven winners at a smart 21% strike rate, matched only by seasoned rider Craig Zackey with strikingly similar stats. However, Richard Fourie was head-and-shoulders above his rivals with 15 winners in KZN alone and well on course for his record attempt at 334 for a season set by Anthony Delpech in 1998. He is assured of the National Title even at this early stage of the season and we wish him well in his quest for the record.
Richard is Gold Circle’s rider of the month for February.
