Guardian Holdings save the day

The Guardian Holdings Day of racing on Boxing Day will forever be etched in the memories of racing fans all over Trinidad and Tobago. For years we have been hearing about moral victories and at last we saw one. This is not intended as an excuse for the fact that we said before the Guardian Holdings Gold Cup that Top of the Class would beat Sugar Mike. The surprising revelation, which came to us on this December afternoon, was that a thing might be done well enough to make victory entirely secondary. We have all heard of course, of sport for sport’s sake but Top of the Class established a still more glamorous ideal. Sport for art’s sake was what he showed us in the expansive Santa Rosa Park, Arima racecourse.

It was the finest tragic performance in the lives of 3,000 fans. We hope that educators present got a classic example on dramatic composition.
None of the crowds who will travel to Greece for the next Olympics and witness more beautiful stadia while in search of Euripides ever saw the spirit of tragedy more truly presented. And we will wager that Euripides was not able to lift his crowd up upon its hind legs into a concerted shout of “Medea! Medea! Medea!” as Top of the Class  moved the racing fans in the tumultuous home straight battle with Sugar Mike for over 100 metres of tension and anxiety. In fact it is our contention that the fight between these two supreme horses was the most inspiring spectacle which Trinidad and Tobago has seen in a generation. Personally we would go further back than that. We would not accept a ticket for David and Goliath as a substitute. We remember that in that instance the little man won, but it was a spectacle less fine in artistry from the fact that it was less true to life.

The tradition that Jack goes up the beanstalk and kills his giant, and that Little Red Riding Hood has the better of the wolf, and many other stories are limited in their inspiration quality by the fact that they are not true. Top of the Class showed us something more thrilling. All of us who watched him know that man cannot beat down fate — a three-year-old locally bred colt, only receiving 7 Kg to Sugar Mike, the more experienced four-year-old colt. Even Miss Lover Lover had received more, 8 kg, in the Stewards Cup and she was also an importation. No matter how much his will may flame, he can rock it back upon its heels when he puts all his heart and his shoulders into a blow. That is what happened in the last 200 metres, as a mesmerised crowd locked on to the duel in their vision, even hard working Guardian Holdings employees  (eager to mentally prepare for their Old Year’s party this week) were transfixed. Ricardo Jadoo aboard Top of the Class stretched his mount out on the rail, as Sugar Mike under the guidance of Brian Harding fought hard for his head. It seems for over 10 seconds that Top of the Class would survive the assault of bubbling heads and jockeys driving for all they are worth. Top of the Class was up by  a length at the top of the straight, then they were even, but there were still all of 200 metres to the Guardian Holdings Gold Cup Trophy.

In the stands the Champion Trainer of 2003 Glen Mendez (Trainer of Top of the Class), Bertwin Samlalsingh (Owner of Sugar Mike), Merlin Samlalsingh (owner of Top of the Class), Peter Ganteaume (CEO, Guardian Holdings Limited), Douglas Camacho (President of Guardian Life of the Caribbean), Gerard Ferreira (President of the Arima Race Club) were all smiling, together whatever the result they knew they had made. Many in racing were happy and proud to be able to need a Guardian to hold all the cash from the Arima Race Club after witnessing this epic. The tragedy of life is not that man loses but that he almost wins. Or if you are intent on pointing out that given the change in jockey, the weight concession that Miss Lover Lover’s downfall was inevitable, that at least he completes the gesture of being on the eve of victory. Rationally though there were no losers on Betting Levy Board Day, because both horses were applauded by an appreciative crowd, who understood what they had witnessed. These two rivals will meet again and the result may be different or the same, but this race will never be reproduced. After the race, even the many children who had joined their parents for the entertainment, were talking about the race, everything stopped for nearly two minutes as racing gained more fans and the Guardian Holdings Group ensured that their clientele would grow, via more people attending racing.

As Top of the Class passed the winner’s enclosure, he glanced at the crowd that gathered to welcome his five-length victor Sugar Mike and there was a sense of tragedy that he had failed his new fans. We resented at once the law of gravity, the Malthusian theory and the fact that a straight line is the shortest distant between two points. We feel that one of the elements of tragedy lies in the fact that fate gets nothing but victories and the championships. Gesture and glamour remain with man. No infighting can take that away from him. Sugar Mike won fairly and squarely. He is a great colt, perhaps the most efficient Trinidad and Tobago has seen in over 20 years, but everybody came away from Santa Rosa Park, talking about Top of the Class. Not even the valiant third place performance of Phantom Bidder (whose wise trainer John O’Brien had instructed his jockey to ride this way) could hide the fact that with Cash Reward in fourth place, that a three-year-old and two four-year-olds had occupied three of the four places in the Guardian Holdings Caribbean Staying Classic in 2003. Sugar Mike won and Top of the Class got all the glory. Perhaps we will have to enlarge our conception of tragedy, for that too is tragic.