Doubles galore at Pune racetrack

Pune: Carrying the Poonawalla family silks, four-year-old Phenomenal Memory, trained by Dallas Todywalla, annihilated his rivals to coast away for an impressive victory in the Her Majesty Trophy, the feature event of Saturday's nine-race card.

Jockey S Zervan who piloted the winner saved precious ground along the inner rails before taking him out and asking for an effort, and the son of Glory Of Dancer out of Phenomenale surged ahead with such power that the rest, including piping hot fancy Heather (PS Chouhan up), were just left marking time. Phenomenal memory finally spared more than three lengths to Rodeo (CS Jodha up) who finished more than four lengths ahead of Heather.

Trainer Dallas Todywalla also saddled another winner in first-timer Motherland who was driven to a facile victory by Yash Narredu in the upper division of the Mariinsky Plate, thus scoring a brace.

Interestingly, there were as many as five braces scored on the Saturday card as, besides trainer Todywalla and Yash Narredu (who had also won astride the Cooji Katrak-trained Silk Baby earlier in the day), trainer Pesi Shroff & jockey Trevor Patel combined to score with The Champ (Juventus Plate) and San Martino (Dr K Vasudevan Trophy).

Jockey Joy Chinoy also matched their feat by converting a chance mount that came his way, Jarama trained by Mansoor Shah who won the War Command Plate, before steering trainer Vishal Gaekwad's debut-maker Miss Saigon to a smashing victory in the last race of the day.