Malaysian jockey A’Isisuhairi Kasim was a picture of joy and relief after he snapped a long run of outs with resuming mare Iffragal shedding her maiden status first-up from a five-month layoff on Friday night.
Punching the air in delight as he weighed back in, the former two-time Singapore champion apprentice jockey would be forgiven for behaving like he had just won a Group 1 race. Harry, as he is better known, would actually know that Group 1-winning feeling after he sensationally steered longshot Gilt Complex to an upset win in the Raffles Cup (1800m) last October.
No doubt, a modest $20,000 Open Maiden race over 1100m was not in the same league, but the broad grin on A’Isisuhairi’s face certainly suggested Iffragal’s win was in his book an Instagram-worthy moment he would bottle up just as enthusiastically.
“This feels like winning a Group 1 race! It’s been five months since my last win on Moritz Eclipse (March 30),” said A’Isisuhairi.
“As you know, rides have been rather rare this year. Mr Clements rang me for the ride and in my situation, I’ll take any ride that comes my way.
“When I looked at her record, I realised that filly ran in much stronger company as a two-year-old.
“We still thought she would need the run tonight, but the way she travelled for me was so professional.
“Mr Clements told me before the race that she can go on the speed but as she was coming back after she bled, we didn’t want to go too hard on her.
“She jumped okay and I just let her settle at the rear where she was comfortable. I knew the leader would start to stop and at the 200m, when my filly hit top gear, I knew I had the race won.”
The win has now edged A’Isisuhairi’s record to five winners for the season – a paltry haul in stark contrast to his score of 18 winners at this time last year, which was actually just another run-of-the-mill season, to put in perspective his current struggle.
Funnily, his season got off to a flier with a Group 3 win in the New Year Cup (1200m) aboard Speedy Dragon, and even the temporary premiership lead when he rode a double at the next meeting, but it turned out to be just a lone spike on his win graph.
On the other hand, Clements showed he had not slept on his laurels in the wake of his career-best season last year when he swept a raft of feature races and finished sixth on 54 winners. A recent transfer from Ricardo Le Grange, Iffragal ($38) was bringing up Clements’ 37th winner to keep him in touch with current lamplighter Shane Baertschiger (42 winners).
The satisfaction was even greater given the inauspicious start the Iffraaj mare made under his watch back in April. She was part of a group of Al-Arabiya Stable horses who left Le Grange and were reassigned to other stables.
“She bled at her first start for me. Her form prior to that was pretty good, she ran second (to Mr Hanks) in a Group race as a two-year-old (the now-defunct Group 3 Juvenile Championship in 2017)” said the Zimbabwean-born handler.
“The big question mark tonight was how she would go with regards to her bleeding, but she’s done a very good job by winning.
“It showed she was not affected anymore by that bleeding attack. She will go even better over more ground.”
With that first success, Iffragal has bumped her earnings up to around the $65,000 mark for the Al-Arabiya Stable.
