JUST?OVER?$57 000 in prize money will be up for grabs on National Heroes Day when the first race of the Barbados Triple Crown will be run off at the Garrison Savannah.
The 63rd edition of the Barbados Guineas – a Grade I event for West Indian-bred three-year-olds at allotted weights – has attracted 14 entrants.
For Monday’s field, fans will see 11 winners competing but the winner will be the only one moving forward with a chance to join an elite group of six horses that went on to win the Triple Crown.
Leading the way among the winners are The Price is Right (5 wins), Vanity Affair (4), Flying South (3) and Snow White, Cabin Boy and Khartoum (reserve No. 2), which all have two wins each.
Among the leading contenders, The Price Is Right has displayed blistering speed for most of her career.
Her main accomplishments are an effortless win in the Elliott Williams Memorial Juvenile Breeders’ Classic Stakes & Trophy and a hard-fought victory in the BTBA Sale-Graduates’ Trophy Condition Race, both over 1 100 metres.
The Bill and Haley Blevins-owned filly has also beaten the other leading candidates with the exception of Cabin Boy.
Although she is bred to get further she is yet to travel this distance. Her trainer Jonathon Simpson is also seeking his first Guineas winner.
 Vanity Affair has never been off the board in her six efforts which includes impressively winning the Michael Parravicino Memorial Breeders’ Stakes & Trophy and the Bajan Blue Restaurant Trophy Condition Race, both over the Guineas trip.
The filly appears to be getting better with every start and further improvement is likely. Owner Mark Armstong and trainer Victor Cheeseman are looking to make it two in a row having won this event for the first time last year with Aston Martin.
Brothers Robin and Stephen Bynoe, Stephen Walcott and Geoffrey Cave have the other strong hand in Flying South, which has won all sprints.
What has been outstanding about this colt’s wins is the manner in which he won, by closing off the pace, which suggests he needs further distance.
In his only attempt at the trip, Flying South trailed in a disappointing fifth in soft conditions behind the winner Koh-I-Noor. Since then, he has rebounded with a solid win, plus a second-place finish behind The Price Is Right.
Part owner and veteran trainer Stephen Bynoe did the trick in the Guineas back in 2005 with Bandruler and he can be expected to have his colt fit and ready.
Three others very capable of upsetting the apple cart are Nekitta, Sweet Bottom Sarah and Janak’s Gold.
Completing the field are Iguazu, Gold Mine (reserve 1) Cavanak and High Tide.
