Civena and Racedays Handicap Hurdle upset
On October 18, the Irish horseracing fans witnessed a nerve-crushing upset at Punchestown where the J. A. Berry trained bay mare beat the 7-2 hot favourite rival, Rawnaq, to win the high-stakes race of 10 Euro Admission All Non Festival Racedays Handicap
Hurdle, run by a dozen of horses.
The results of the race were quite astonishing and unbelievable. The bettors, who had staked their money on Rawnaq, were totally shocked to see an underdog winning the mega event.
Before the beginning of the contest, no one could even imagine that Civena would give such a tough time to such a strong rival.
The race began at 3:15 (GMT). Civena started under Paul Townend. From the first step, she looked to be aggressive enough. For a few seconds, Rawnaq ran parallel to her but the Robert Alan Hennessy trained bay gelding could not bear the pressure and got slow,
giving a chance to the maverick mare to maintain a reasonable lead.
Once the Goforit Syndicate owned mare managed to go almost two lengths ahead of her competitors, she was hard to be caught. Thus, she convincingly finished first by the margin of 2 ¾ lengths.
Rawnaq stood second while the third top spot went to Caheronaun. Overall, the results were far away from what the sport analysts were predicting.
It was Civena’s third career victory. She broke her maiden by winning the 5yo Mares Maiden (Div 2) at Ballyragget on March 20, 2011. There too, she defeated the favourite candidate, Teffia Gold, to win.
Her second success came on July 7 when she beautifully beat Zadarska to finish first in the Sam's Potatoes Maiden Hurdle, held at Bellewstown. Interestingly, she was a non-favourite runner for this race as well.
Thus, it is proved that the daughter of Oscar out of The Village Merc is famous for her epic upsets. Unfortunately, the punters always underrate her.
It is hoped that Civena will bring home some glorious titles in the months to come as the grand victory of October 18 boosted up her stamina and morale to a great extent. The trainer is keen to administer some new techniques on his mare to build up her momentum
further.
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are the writer's own and do not reflect Bettor.Com’s editorial policy.
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