MIKE de Kock hasn’t been this excited about a young horse in a long time. He is taken with three-year-old Mount Pleasant (AUS), who gave several formidable older rivals a convincing beating in the R175 000 Gr2 Joburg Spring Challenge over 1450m at Turffontein on Saturday.
Mount Pleasant (13-10), coming off a 14-week rest and, as per Mike’s pre-race assessment not fully wound up, raced into contention with 300m to go. Callan Murray pushed him into the lead, and they fought off the challenges launched by Sean Tarry’s accomplished duo of Cirillo (5-2) and Chimichuri Run (7-1) to win by a length.
“Mount Pleasant is a horse of international quality. He’ll win a Gr1 in Australia, of that I have no doubt. To do what he did here was amazing. I’ve never seen him blowing like this, but he deserved to blow if you look at the horses behind him!”
Bred by Makybe, Mount Pleasant is out of the exciting Golden Slipper winning Medaglia D’Oro stallion Vancouver (Aus), from a mare by Fastnet Rock, and he was a A$ 90 000 buy at the 2019 Inglis Melbourne Premier Yearling Sale Jehan Malherbe’s Form Bloodstock.
Mount Pleasant is owned by Dave MacLean, who has enjoyed a good run of success in the yard and Mike said: “Dave’s invested in horseracing. He’s put his money down, he deserves a horse like this.”
Mount Pleasant, 3 from 3, has won R231 000 in stakes. Mike said that the champion-producing Dingaans, over a mile at Turffontein, was likely to be his next aim.
