Sport of kings: Lacklustre Pakistan Derby disappoints fans

LAHORE:

Quality Road, a thoroughbred, won the Pakistan Derby face on Sunday.The winning horse belongs to Saeed Ismail Shah, Pir Pagara’s grandson.

The 64th edition of the Pakistan Derby was run at the Lahore Race Club at Kot Lakhpat.

The event kicked off with nine horses, selected from some 100 entries, racing for the 100-metre Classic followed by the Semi Classic and the 12-furlong Pakistan Derby_ the three categories of the total seven races at the event.

Tariq Aziz, the Lahore Race Club president, was also present at the event.

The registrations for the horses take place nearly two years before the race, with each horse allowed to run only one of the races.

Naeem Iqbal, one of the spectators, said that the excitement begins right from the time the horses march into the field. Sarmad Mansoor, a banker and an avid derby fan, said that Pakistan Derby was clearly the biggest event for horse racing enthusiasts in the country. “It’s, as they say at the Kentucky Derby, the biggest certainty in the uncertainty,” he said. He said for most horse owners winning the Pakistan Derby was the biggest dream.

Regretting the shrinking numbers of spectators over the last few years, Mansoor said that Derby used to be a family event. “In India it is still a glamorous event, but in Pakistani it is unfortunately seen as a punter sport,” he said. He said before partition, many cities in what is now Pakistan, were breeding hubs for high quality thoroughbreds. Sarghoda and Sahiwal were considered the prime areas for breeding high quality horses.

Mansoor said that the government’s support was necessary to restore the sport’s reputation. He said it was the sport of the kings and could bring international recognition because of the domestic bloodline.

Col Masood Anwar, another visitor, said that a horse’s bloodline was very important to the enthusiasts. He said speed and stamina were the factors that gave a horse its standing international classification.

“We have a great bloodline but the glamour is lacking,” he said, adding that Quality Road could have beaten any Indian horse. “In England the winning horse could have easily fetched more than £200,000. I strongly believe we have the potential to compete internationally,” he said.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 7^th, 2011.