VARIOUS refinements have been made to the programme for the 2011 Phumelela Summer-Autumn Feature Race Season, which kicked off a few days ago and boasts nearly 50 feature events over three months.

The most significant change is that the R1-million Empress Club Stakes (Grade 1) for females at weight-for-age over 1600m has been switched from the end of February to the night meeting on Tuesday 12 April.

The date has been changed in order to more evenly spread the four Grade 1 races for females over middle distances. The programming committee believed it was difficult for horses to compete in the Grade 1 Paddock Stakes and the Grade 1 Majorca Stakes in Cape Town in January and return to the Highveld for the Empress Club at the end of February. The fourth Grade 1 in this category is the Garden Province Stakes in July and repositioning the Empress Club was believed to be essential.

This in turn necessitated several other changes to the programme:

* The R165 000 Acacia Handicap (Grade 3) for females over 1600m has moved to Saturday 26 February
* The R165 000 Jacaranda Handicap (Grade 3) for females over 1800m is now on Saturday 26 March (Classic Day)
* The R300 000 Gerald Rosenberg Stakes (Grade 2) for females over 2000m has been moved from early April to Champions Day on Saturday 30 April

The feature-race line-up for three-year-old sprinters has been enhanced by the introduction of the R150,000 Gold Rush Sprint – a handicap over 1100m on Saturday 5 March. The new race falls three weeks before the R200,000 Man O’ War Stakes (a Grade 3 conditions race for three-year-olds over 1100m) and forms the middle leg of the recently announced “Var Series” (sponsored by the Var Syndicate). The other two legs are in Cape Town in January and KwaZulu-Natal in June.

The R200,000 Caradoc Gold Cup (Grade 3) over 2850m at Turffontein on 26 March 2011 has been changed from a handicap to a conditions race.

Other news is that the Highveld Programme is to be produced twice a year instead of three times – May to September (winter programme) and October to April (summer programme).

The benchmarks for Divided Handicaps have been amended as follows:

* Summer programme (October to April) – 94 (Open); 90 (F&M)
* Winter programme (May to September) – 90 (Open); 86 (F&M)

Excluding the monthly low grade meetings, the lowest handicap races to be programmed in the summer period will be MR 72 (Open) and MR 68 (F&M).

The sex allowance for females in Pinnacle Plates has been increased from 2kg as follows:

1000m to 1300m: 2,5kg
1400m to 1700m: 3kg
1800m and upwards: 3,5kg