Muzi Yeni And Flower Island Produce A Thriller

De Kock Racing saddled its seventh winner of the Grade 2 Betway Joburg FM Spring Challenge when Flower Island, who looked beaten with 200m to go, produced a late surge to get her head in front in a thrilling finish.

Muzi Yeni gave Flower Island what Lucky Fish ambassador Mathew de Kock described as the ‘ride of the season’. With so much high-quality speed and tactical nous from the other astute riders around him, Muzi had to combine judgement of the pace with patience and composure – and rely on help from his mount.

The diminutive jock suggested that the tricky inside track had influenced his decision-making and said: “Mat asked me to trust her and I had to. They went a bit too hard and I couldn’t force her. She gathered her feet up underneath me, but when they fanned out, I couldn’t get enough room to make a good decision.

“I had to ask her to go fetch them late, and good horse that she is, she did. They have to win races like this to go up another level, and Flower Island showed her quality. She’s a classy individual and looked a million dollars in the ring.”

This 1450m feature is a standard setter for the best fillies and those destined for success in breeding paddocks. Its roll of honour contains a number of mares who went on to make their mark at stud – including Welwitschia (dam of Desert Miracle) and Festival Of Fire (dam of Destiny of Fire) – both trained by Mike de Kock.

Bred by Wilgerbosdrift and Mauritzfontein, Flower Island was a R500,000 purchase from the 2025 BSA National Yearling Sale and races in the interests of Jess and Steven Jell, Mike de Kock, Chris Haynes, George Ragunan, Noelene Malherbe and Fieldspring Racing. She now has three wins and a place from four starts, with earnings of R666,876.

By Ridgemont kingpin Rafeef (Redoute’s Choice), Flower Island is out of the Gr1 SA Fillies Classic winner, Orchid Island (Silvano), who won five times up to 1800m from sixteen starts.

According to Mat, the Starling Stakes could be next for Flower Island, with the WSB Gr1 Cape Fillies Guineas in December also in the plans.

Duke Of Lorraine, improving.

Flower Island’s win gave the De Kock team a race-on-race double, after Duke Of Lorraine (7-1) was steered to victory by Craig Zackey a half hour earlier. To cap it all, Sosoru won Race 8 over 1200m with a good front-running performance for Callan Murray.

De Kock Racing saddled five winners and 10 places over three meetings this week to move into the Top 5 on the National Log.