TAB and TOTE customers can join in the incredible excitement of some of the best racing on the planet this weekend with chances galore to win piles of cash, including two Pick 6 carryovers and betting into the Hong Kong World Pool tote.
The show kicks off with the R350,000 Betway Algoa Cup at Fairview this Friday. This 2000m race has long been one of the highlights of the racing year in Gqeberha and this time round a R500,000 Pick 6 carryover is heightening the excitement. The carryover should generate a total pool of some R2.5 million with prospects of a big payout.
A Hollywoodbets Greyville fixture goes side by side with Fairview from mid-afternoon and come Friday night the international action gets underway with the two-day Breeders’ Cup spectacular at Del Mar, a seaside track long known as where the turf meets the surf.
This is perhaps the best thoroughbred action on earth with an all-star cast from 13 countries converging on Del Mar for 14 Grade 1 blockbusters carrying total prize money of over $34 million.
The five Grade 1s for two-year-olds will be run on Friday and, as always, the $7-million Breeders’ Cup Classic and $5-million Breeders’ Cup Turf will be the highlights of Saturday’s action. The show gets going at 20:35 SA time today and at 19:05 tomorrow.
The only South African contender at Breeders’ Cup is dual Grade 1 winner One Stripe, who takes on a formidable field in the Breeders’ Cup Mile on turf (01:05 Sunday morning SA time).
The Friday meeting will wrap up at 02:25 on Saturday and less than an hour later, and thousands of miles away, the Grade 1 Victoria Derby race meeting at Flemington in Melbourne will get under way.
This all-graded-races card is the best raceday in Australia and it’s also a Hong Kong Jockey Club World Pool event. TAB and TOTE customers can take Win, Place, Quinella and Swinger bets into the huge Hong Kong pools, plus Exactas, Trifectas, Quartets, Rolling Doubles and a Jackpot into Tabcorp pools.
Victoria Derby Day is also the first of the four mega meetings that comprise the Melbourne Cup Carnival and is followed by Melbourne Cup Day (Tuesday 4 November), Oaks Day (6 November) and Champion Stakes Day (9 November).
Later on Saturday comes the Allied Steelrode On a Mission Charity Mile. This is one of the major events on the Joburg racing calendar with the R1-million topliner backed by an undercard that includes five feature races.
A R500,000 Pick 6 carryover is adding plenty of hype to the occasion and should generate a total pool of over R3 million!