Belgian jockey puts European woes behind him with Met-day treble

The department of home affairs might be getting an application for permanent residence from Belgian-born jockey Christophe Soumillon. The France-based rider must think SA is the sweet life after a memorable meeting at Kenilworth on Saturday.

In September Soumillon, 41, made the headlines for all the wrong reasons when elbowing jockey Rossa Ryan out of the saddle at St Cloud racecourse in Paris. He was slapped with a 60-day ban.

That suspension ended in early January when trainer Eric Sands announced he had booked Soumillon to partner Golden Ducat in the King’s Plate.

Commenting on the booking, Sands said: “Soumillon rises to the occasion and gets horses to rise to the occasion. In my book, he is one of the three best jockeys in the world.”

Horses certainly responded to the Belgian’s urges on Saturday when he won three of the first six races scoring on Sands runner Carriacou in the second, Desert Miracle in the fourth (the Majorca Stakes) and Rascova in the sixth (the Summer Juvenile Stakes).

Despite a wide draw, Soumillion finished second on Dave The King in the R7.5m Gold Rush — it meant he got his percentage of the R1m second place prize money — not bad for less than two minutes work, even in euros.

Next up was the four-year-old, Isivunguvungu, in the Cape Flying Championship and the visiting jockey took third place behind Gimme A Prince and former champion sprinter, Rio Querari.

There wasn’t to be a fairy-tale ending in the big race — the WSB Met — in which Golden Ducat was never a serious factor finishing in ninth place behind Jet Dark and Kommetdieding.

With 100m to go in the grade 1 race, Gavin Lerena must have thought he had achieved back-to-back Met wins on Kommetdieding, but Richard Fourie got a great finishing burst out of Jet Dark to snare the 2021 Durban July winner in the final strides.

“Jet Dark jumped a patch and lost a bit of momentum. We got bumped a few times but he got there,” enthused Fourie after the race.

Justin Snaith can take a bow for his handling of Jet Dark throughout his career. This was his ninth success and took his career earnings over R5.6m.

A wide draw counted against Cousin Casey who finished fifth and those who supported sixth-placed Rascallion can only have looked on in horror as — similar to the 2021 Durban July — he again encountered traffic problems with all Vaughan Marshall's hard work going up in smoke.

One journalist described it as “a torrid trip” — she got it 100% correct.

Fourie’s bank balance will have been boosted by his successes on Saturday. Not only did he win the Met (worth R1,187,500 to the connections) but also he gets his percentage of the R5m first prize after capturing the R7.5m Gold Rush on another Snaith inmate, Royal Aussie.

Bred at Klawervlei Stud — the new home of Kommetdieding — Royal Aussie is a son of Royal Mo and may take his chance against Charles Dickens in next month’s Cape Derby.