CHATRIE TRIPLES UP

Long serving jockey, Aaron Chatrie who seems to have less of a say in the camp of trainer Gary Subratie these days, reminded many of his skills on Saturday when he brought home a hard to spot triple which caused nighmares for a lot of bettors . Chatrie won on Cruising Motion for Ray Phillips at 25-1; then came Memory of TS for Anthony Nunes at 8/5. The third victory came from Shellian Grey at 27-1 for Clinton McLeish. It was therefore three winners for Chatrie for three different trainers. A good day for the young man. THAT DEAD HEATIt does not happen often but when it does quite a bit of excitement is generated.

Storming Flyer (Omar Walker) and

Patch (Chalrick Budhai) dead-heated in the fifth race on Saturday for first place and, of course, punters at the racetrack were ever busy telling whoever wanted to hear who the winner was, just before the official announcement was made. First it was Walker who made his way to the winners’ enclosure with Budhai hovering close around. In the end both had smiles on their faces, they had accomplished a rare racing feat. A victory each, not bad at all. BUSY CLAIMING BOX ON SATURDAYThe claiming box was very busy on Saturday as a total of 13 horses were claimed on the 10-race programme.

Clearly Ours, who won the second race, was claimed from Marlon Anderson by Clifton McLeish for Stanley Lindsay for $180,000.In the sixth race,

Fiftyonestorm was taken from Rudolph Hardial by Oneil Markland for Michael Howard for $450,000.Donald Clarke claimed

Light Brigade from Tyrone Prince for Ramone; Johnny Wilmot lost

Argument Done to Delroy Wisdom for Warrenton McLean; Patrick Chang took

Memory of TS for Richard White from Anthony Nunes and Andrew McDonald claimed

Sir Leyland Hall from Lawrence Freemantle for Leroy Williams from the seventh race. All of these claims were made for $250,000.In the 10th race on the $180,000 tag,

Moneyneversleep was claimed from Barrington Rambally by Robert Darby Snr for himself;

Ninelifecat was claimed from Carl Anderson by Arnold Rambally acting as both trainer and owner;

Tropicaldepression was taken by Dwight Chen for Carl Blake from Paul Smith;

Junior Don was claimed from Robert Darby Snr by Anthony Nunes for Stephen Narinesingh;

Chief Secretariat was claimed from Dwight Chen by Enos Brown for Hubert Kerr;

Shellian Grey was taken by Andrew McDonald for himself from Clifton McLeish and

Meet Justin was claimed from Anthony Subratie by Linton Calder for David Mariott. THE ‘ASSAULT’ CONTINUES

Royal Assault who has been missing from competitive racing since November 30 of last year due to ‘wear and tear’ returned on Saturday in fine fettle showing no adverse effects from his long layoff. The five-year-old chestnut horse easily put away his 11 rivals by over two lengths in an Overnight Allowance event for three-year-olds and upwards over the five straight.

Royal Assault (Linton Steadman) showed good speed at the off and stayed with the field for the first three furlongs (600m) until coming across the dummy rails, when he drew clear for a comfortable win.

Dancing Queen (Percy Williams) came from far behind for second money with

Action Man (Wesley Henry) in third place. The winning time was a fast 58.1 seconds on the resurfaced track. Nunes said that it was a good first run from his charge. “It [performance] was pretty good considering he (

Royal Assault) hadn’t run in about six months. He was not over prepared for the race, as we just gave him enough to run here. He is about 70 per cent fit and his class did the rest in the race,” Nunes said. Commenting on the condition of

Royal Assault, Nunes answered: “Well, it was just a case of wear and tear. It is just a situation with horses as they get older, especially when they are good, they overdo it sometimes and hurt themselves. There is nothing really wrong with

Royal Assault but it is just that he has wear and tear on him and it is my job now to pick the right races for him to be successful.”