Hawwaam added another Grade 1 victory to his impressive record with victory in the HF Oppenheimer Horse Chestnut Stakes over 1600m at Turffontein on Saturday.

It was a very relaxed Hawwaam who swept passed Cirillo 300m from the line under Callan Murray to beat a fast-finishing Queen Supreme by 1.40 lengths with Cirillo a head back in third.

That improved the Mike de Kock-trained colt’s record to nine wins and two places from 12 starts, four of those victories coming in Grade 1 races. Hawwaam drifted in the betting and at one stage one could get 15-10 as money came for stablemate Soqrat. In the end, he went off at 23-20.

Maybe it was partly because there was no crowd at the course but on Saturday Hawwaam paraded with the other horses, was relaxed at the start and gave no difficulty going into the stalls. “He’s been completely different since coming back from Cape Town,” said De Kock. “He’s started to do a lot of things right again.

“It doesn’t happen by chance. There are a lot of guys who have been working hard on him.”

One of those people is Murray, who had dream ride on the four-year-old. “He settled well but the I didn’t have cover for a few strides. But then Raymond (Danielson on Cirillo) pulled off and gave me the best lead I could have asked for, so it really turned out well.”

Hawwaam will next be aimed at the Premier’s Champions Challenge on 27 June but is then likely to miss the KwaZulu-Natal season.

“Sheikh Hamdan is desperate to have him abroad,” said De Kock. “I would like to travel him as well. He’s good enough.

“We’re going to run him at the end of the month but we will have to think hard about whether we take him to Durban or not because we might have to go into quarantine before the running of the Durban July, which is sad.

“He’s a horse who would fly the South African flag abroad.” 

Tabnews