Good memories and Dennis Bosch remembers them so well. His rides on Black Killer for owner P.R.Dowling I think were outstanding as he swooped down late to win going away in his feature wins at Greyville.
Also mention of owner Frank de Meillon who was a jeweller if not mistaken. This owner had horses with Eddie Harvey and Brian Cherry as his main trainers. Sometimes it was fun to figure out if a Cherry trained horse won in one of the Jackpot races, then a De Meillon owned and Harvey trained runner would most likely pop up in one of the other legs, more often at decent odds.
There was a good batch of jockeys in that era in KZN and a few names like Stephen Jupp, Michael Du Preez, Brian Strydom, Martin Shum, Ryk and Rudy Niewenhuis [R & J ], Thomas Labuschagne, Brian Passmore, Brian Deyes, Robin Watkinson, Vincent Curtis, Joe Byrnes, Dave Byrnes , T.Kennedy, D.Mustard ,P.Wynne etc. often appeared along the more famous riders like Bertie Hayden and Michael Roberts.
However it could be evident from the above that there were no jockeys of colour in the riding ranks in that era and although the racecourse was the place to be on a Saturday afternoon, the African Enclosure was a good 400 mts away from the finishing post and there was always a roar from that section of the crowd when the runners passed the 400mt pole. :whistle:
Last edit: 8 years 8 months ago by mikesack.
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