Tales Of Bravery got his Champions Season off to a flying start with a smart victory in the Drill Hall Stakes (Gr 2) at Greyville on Saturday evening and the Vaughan Marshall-trained gelding heads up a solid entry for the R300 000 Betting World 1900 to be run at the same venue on Tuesday, May 22.

The winner of this race is almost guaranteed a berth in the field for the Vodacom Durban July and has consequently attracted 34 entries many of whom will be looking to book a place in the big race.

Chesalon, scratched from this year’s J&B Met through injury by trainer Mike Bass, made a pleasing return to the track on Saturday, finishing second to Tales Of Bravery in the Drill Hall and will do much better over this trip while Polar Bound made a winning Champions Season debut for trainer Brett Crawford beating a useful field. Star filly Beach Beauty, second behind Princess Victoria in a recent sprint at Clairwood, is also entered and along with the Mike de Kock-trained Berry Blaze is one of two fillies nominated.

Trainer Dean Kannemeyer could well use this race to catapult the highly rated three-year-old Taipan into the July while Sean Tarry has entered three-year-olds Heavy Metal and Whiteline Fever and will be hoping that course specialist and recent Greyville winner Gold Onyx has better luck leading up the Vodacom Durban July this year and he makes the final field.