WORLD CLASS...and there's no denying it.

Yesterday we showcased the latest International Thoroughbred Rankings, which included the World Top Twenty. In what is quite the most emphathic recognition to date of the quality of horse racing in this country, all of Sun Classique (the highest rated filly in the world), Jay Peg and Pocket Power weighed in on the list, and by our reckoning, that would put these horses in the top 0,5% of the world’s best runners, in a population of racehorses across the world in excess of 250 000.

It’s a sobering thought then, that in very recent times, both Jay Peg and Pocket Power went down to Summerhill-breds, in the case of Jay Peg when Dynamite Mike “smoked” him in the KZN Guineas, and in Pocket Power’s case, when Imbongi ran him down at weight-for-age in last weekend’s Drill Hall Stakes.

There are all sorts of arguments about where these horses were in preparation terms at the time of their defeats, but there is one incontrovertible fact about the truth. Malice may attack it, ignorance may deride it, but in the end, there it is!