GHAALLA proved that there are R5-million reasons for her connections to smile as the swift progress by the Var sired filly yielded a maiden win at her first attempt at Turffontein on Saturday.

The Sheik Hamdan owned Varsfontein bred is by established Avontuur sire, Var, a stallion producing the super speed we see in many horses he sired in the South African breeding ranks.

Gavin Lerena produced GHAALLA who was a warm favourite at 5-4 over the 1160m Juvenile Plate race. She moved up into contention like a nice type and could line up in the Fillies Nursery in due course. Mike De Kock trained the record R5 million National Yearling Sales purchase. 

In other news from the weekend Jackson produced his first winner. BOUNTIFUL STRENGTH a 2yo Bay colt by out of Generous Gabriella (USA) by Forest Wildcat (USA) won nicely for Joey Ramsden. Incidentally his dam sire is the same as super sire Var.

In Hong Kong, the breaking news from this morning is that Singapore Sling was just beaten in the prestigious HK Derby, a race that stops Hong Kong in many ways. The South African bred lost to a very good John Size trained horse, Ping Hai Star. The South African started as the second favourite. The Millard runner was niggled at around the final turn but still produced an effort running down all but one from his mid field position only to be outgunned by the flying come from last to first Ryan Moore ridden horse.

Nevertheless not disgraced and a great advertisement for South African breeding.

 Image from HK Derby Day