Trainer Fabian Habib appears to have a very decent three-year-old in his stable and on Saturday, Zeus will put his unbeaten record on the line when he runs in Race 3, a merit rated 95 Handicap for three-year-olds over 1800m on the Turffontein Inside track.
So far, the son of Soft Falling Rain could not have been more impressive. He may just have scraped home in his victory on debut but the money that saw him go off a 16-10 favourite indicated he had to be showing a lot at home.
He has gone on to win two more race and on those occasions the victories were by wide margins – 4.25 lengths and 3.25 lengths respectively. It is true that he has not beaten much but not only have toe victories been achieved in style, but a number of winners have come out of his form lines three from his first win, two from his second and one from his third.
He will be tested this time as he does meet a very decent band of horses – and he will have to give weight to all of them.
However, he does look special and is expected to overcome those hurdles and add a fourth win to his record. It will be interesting to see whether Habib will be prepared to take on some of the best of his age group around in the Grade 1 SA Classic over 1800m later this month.
Gavin Lerena has ridden him in all three races and he will be reunited with Zeus again on Saturday.
The main threat is likely to come from Mike de Kock-trained Run As One. He is a winner of three of his eight races and has performed particularly well over 1800m with two wins and a third from just three runs.
He will be getting 2.5kg from Zeus, has the benefit of No 1 draw and will have Muzi Yeni, who won on him last time, in the irons.
Another horse who was highly rated but took a while to come to hand is Flashy Apache. Tyrone Zackey’s runner came in for betting support early in his career but had an awful tendency to hang badly.
He seems to have go over it and has won his last two races with He just keeps getting better and will get 5.5kg from Zeus.
Denis Schwarz was on him for both his wins and will be back in the irons for this run.
Clive Robinson
