Big Bay was the smartest to jump out from the gates, but Suraj decided to play second fiddle to Miracle Star (A Sandesh up) who, quite surprisingly for a race of this level, set a rather easy pace, clocking almost 26 seconds for the first two furlongs
Jockey Suraj Narredu astride Big Bay winning The Poonawalla Breeders Multimillion (Grade-1) race held at Mahalaxmi Racecourse in Mumbai. Pic/Ashish Raje
The Malesh Narredu-trained Big Bay, ridden by his nephew Suraj Narredu, outclassed his 14 rivals to win the Gr 1, Poonawalla Breeders' Multi-Million (PBMM), the feature event of Sunday's seven-race card at the Mahalaxmi racetrack. Interestingly, with Big Bay's victory the ace jockey, who crossed the 2000-win mark more than five years ago to command the living legend status, completed a unique hat-trick for the big race as he had won it with Excellent Lass last year and Elpenor in 2023.
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It was quite a sight to look at the men and women who own Big Bay--Balam Mohla, Mrs Rashmee Amersee, Sanjay Kothari, Anil Saraf, Mrs BE Saldanha, Jehangir Mehta and Mrs Homi Mehta--who rushed onto the racetrack with to lead in their proud property after Big Bay and Suraj Narredu returned to strut in front of a cheering crowd.
Big Bay was the smartest to jump out from the gates, but Suraj decided to play second fiddle to Miracle Star (A Sandesh up) who, quite surprisingly for a race of this level, set a rather easy pace, clocking almost 26 seconds for the first two furlongs. On straightening up Suraj easily overhauled the leader to take charge, and when Circle Of Dreams (Askhay Kumar up) and Prokofiev (David Allan) pressed the pedal for an all out effort from their mounts, Big Bay leapt ahead like a kangaroo to open up a big lead over them. The discouraged duo were soon left to fight for the runner up berth which, in a photo finish, went in favour of Circle Of Dreams.
"It's a fantastic feeling to win this kind of a big race, but I was merely a pilot on Big Bay," Suraj Narredu refused to take the credit. "It was my uncle (Malesh) who did a fabulous job in training him." Suraj thanked the owners of Big Bay for great support, and expressed hope the Narredu family will continue to win many more.
"A big 'thank you' to Big Bay for adding this race to my training portfolio," trainer Malesh Narredu expressed his joy. As jockey Malesh had won the PBMM race three times (Lei in 1996, Indiscretion in 1998 and Fedora in 2005), but as trainer this was his first victory.
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