Jack Milner: There is an expression in horseracing when describing the chances of a proverbial good thing that the horse could fall down, get up and still win.
That is the case with jockey Lyle Hewitson who has had his third jockeys’ championship title wrapped for a couple of months already. With just one week to go until the end of the 2020/21 season, Hewitson, at the time of writing, had ridden 257 winners, 84 clear of defending champion Warren Kennedy.
Hewitson has a busy week and will be in action at Greyville on Monday, where they race on the Polytrack.
One of his jobs on the day will be trying to get Shampompo Shampizi back into the winner’s enclosure in Race 7, a MR 79 Handicap over 1400m.
Alyson Wright’s charge finished like a rocket on debut to score an impressive 1.90-length victory over Llasa Star over 1000m on the Greyville turf. Hewitson rode him on that occasion and the victory gave the impression it would not be long before the three-year-old Var gelding would score his second victory.
Unfortunately, that has not happened. While Shampompo Shampizi has not run badly, his next three races saw him finish fourth each time. Hewitson rode him in his first three starts but Kennedy had the ride last time.
In his second start, Shampompo Shampizi did try the Polytrack over this distance but after hitting the front early in the straight, he did not kick on and finished 3.15 length behind Tromso.
His last start was against much stronger company in the Non-Black Type Durban Dash over 1100m. Fortune has not favoured him in his last two and hopefully he will be able to put it all together this time.
His danger could be Duncan Howells’ Naval Secret who has won on the Polytrack and has Muzi Yeni up.
Jack Milner’s selections
Race 1: 2 Conquer The Enemy, 1 Uncomplicated, 6 The Green Gallant, 3 Admiral Birnham