'Honey' to delight race fans

Orville Clarke, Gleaner Writer

The unbeaten American-bred three-year-old colt DOUBLE THE HONEY looks all set to make it four in a row at Caymanas Park today, when he takes on 11 rivals in the overnight allowance race over 1200 metres.

Owned by Edison Chai and trained by reigning champion Wayne DaCosta, DOUBLE THE HONEY, who made his debut as a two-year-old last November, is unbeaten in three starts, humbling none other than RONRON in his last two races on March 17 and April 5 (Easter Monday), respectively.

Since then, the Gary Subratie-trained RONRON has won four consecutive races in fast times, including the valuable Hall-of-Fame Stakes Trophy over 1200 metres on June 12, in stakes record time of 1:11.1.

Indeed, the connections of RONRON have vowed that DOUBLE THE HONEY will never beat her again. But this is debatable, as it is generally believed that up to 1200 metres, or in sprints, DOUBLE THE HONEY is the more effective.

With the imported horses such as CASSANOVA BOY, who is unbeaten in nine starts, DOUBLE THE HONEY RONRON, SIR VON and FLUFFY setting themselves apart from the local-bred horses, 'HONEY' should have little difficulty in putting away the much-improved REGGAE ROCK and the recent winner JAYLEN.

Despite a setback since he last raced on April 5, DOUBLE THE HONEY has fully recovered. The three-year-old son of Double Honour - Ahoneyofabonny has been taken to task at exercise in preparation for this race, turning in bullet work after bullet work.

On Sunday morning, he galloped 5 1/2 furlongs in 1:06.3, the last five in 1:00.0 flat.

With his preparation complete, DOUBLE THE HONEY with champion jockey Omar Walker again at the helm, cannot be opposed. He has good speed and although giving away weight to each of his opponents, should set off in front from the number-one post position and make all impressively.

Astonishing RUN

This is a horse who ran an astonishing 1:04.1 for 1100 metres when slamming RONRON by 9 1/2 lengths on March 17 and should use this race as a stepping stone for better things.

The Robert Darby Sr-trained REGGAE ROCK, who won over the distance in the fairly good time of 1:12.3 on June 12, returns with a mere 47.0kg for the services of the improving flyweight apprentice Richard Cole, and should complete the exacta ahead of JAYLEN and the DaCosta-trained DIABOLICAL KID.

Other firm fancies on the card are TOBAGO to win the second race, CRUISER to go one better in the fifth, SKIPAWAY PRINCE to stave off old rival SEA TRAVELLER in the sixth and the lightly raced but well prepared three-year-old filly SEA DEVIL in the seventh.