Up The Creek and 3yo stable companion Bimbina vied for top place on the betting boards, with Up The Creek eventually starting favourite at 22/10 - and she proved superior on the day. The 5yo mare surged to the front at the 200m marker and kept going to hold Velozia to a length, with Enchanted Garden a neck away in third place, three lengths ahead of Bimbina.
It was a class performance at weight-for-age, but Velozia may well have given her more to do had she not been slow away and met with interference when jockey Lloyd dropped his rein on Enchanted Garden, who was hanging.
Terrance Millard trains Up The Creek for breeder Godfrey Gird. She has now earned close on R260 000 in eight wins from 17 starts, her victories including the Natal Fillies Guineas and the Garden Province Stakes twice.
ENCHANTED GARDEN (1982 f Roland Gardens - Captivation by London Way). Enchanted Garden was bred at Rose Parker’s Ascot Stud in the Eastern Cape. Her dam Captivation, whose half-brothers Captive Prince (by Prince Sao) and Captain Ekels (by Jan Ekels) were top class stayers, won once, over 1000m at 2. Enchanted Garden sold to Mr and Mrs A M van Zyl for R35.000 at the 1984 National Yearling Sales, to go into training with Jim Brady. Coming to hand early, she had no less than 10 starts in her juvenile season for five wins and three places, including the Gr1 TAB Transvaal Juvenile Fillies Stakes, making her one of the top fillies of her generation.
Des Scott purchased the filly for R200.000 at the end of her 2yo career and transferred her to David Payne at Summerveld. She won a B Division in Natal before narrowly beating a classy field in the Fillies Guineas at Germiston. Her trainer David Payne boldly predicted she would beat Petrava in the Paddock Stakes, but things didn\'t quite work out that way. After running fourth to Bimbina in the Highlands Stud Classic (formerly Cape Fillies Guineas), she could do no better than third in the Paddock Stakes (Petrava did not run).
The filly subsequently changed hands again, to Tony Ross and Adrian Gardiner, for R300.000 and was transferred to Terrance Millard. Her first outing for Millard was on the Rand in the Oaks Trial, where she gave 6.5kg to narrow winner Shotgun Wedding. Enchanted Garden was in full cry two weeks later in the SA Oaks, which she won by 3½ lengths in record time. This was followed by another eyecatching performance in the Sun International, despite an objection for crossing stable mate Potomac close home. Enchanted Garden clocked her 3rd Gr1 in a row when registering a 2 length victory in the Natal Oaks. She was also part of Millard’s first-three-past-the-post in the Rothmans July, finishing 3rd to stable mates Occult and Fools Holme. In the last race of her 3yo season, Enchanted Garden met with interference in the Mainstay International and failed to produce her usual form. She had done enough to be crowned Champion 3yo Filly and Horse of the Year and was rated by conditioner Terrance Millard as “the best middle distance filly this country has seen for years. She has no equals.”
Enchanted Garden opened her 4yo career with a victory in the John Skeaping. The rain delayed Barclays 200 000 turned into a 2-horse affair between the filly and Model Man, in a race where draw, going and pace proved significant, allowing Model Man to get the better of her by five lengths. Back in Cape Town, Enchanted Garden gave a devastating performance in the Listed Shawco Rag Handicap in March and looked on song for the flu-delayed J&B Met. As expected, the Met had no real early pace, but produced an exciting tussle between Model Man and Enchanted Garden in the last 100m, in which Model Man hung on to win by a neck. Her subsequent Natal winter season campaign was an anti-climax.
With 12 wins and 10 places on her cv, Enchanted Garden retired to Ross & Gardiner’s Roodefontein Stud. She had 4 foals of which 3 were runners, all winners, including her daughter Fairy Garden (by Elliodor), who produced Gr1 Cape Derby and Gr1 Paddock Stakes winner Dog Wood.
Legacy: 1985 Gr1 TAB Transvaal Juvenile Fillies Stakes, 1985 Gr1 Gosforth Park SA Fillies Guineas, 1986 Gr1 SA Oaks, 1986 Gr1Sun International, 1986 Gr1 Natal Oaks; Champion 3yo Filly & Horse of the Year 1985/86
Up The Creek
UP THE CREEK (1980 f, Royal Prerogative – Mountain Drive by Buckpasser). Bred at Godfrey Gird\'s Maine Chance Farms, Up The Creek is by Champion Sire Royal Prerogative out of Mountain Drive, an unraced half-sister to stallion Ribofilio. She raced in the colours of Graham Beck and his wife Rhona, trained by Terrance Millard. Up The Creek started her career as a 3yo with a debut-win and two second places, after which came five consecutive wins including the SA Fillies Guineas and Garden Province Stakes. She was voted Champion 3yo Filly. At 4 Up The Creek won the Garden Province Stakes for a second time, and was twice Gr1-placed. She didn’t lose her appetite for racing at five the next season, beating stable companion Bimbina in the Paddock Stakes, and was the first female home in the Queen’s Plate, when third to Yamani and Mauritzfontein. She retired with 8 wins for career earnings of R260.000, to be covered by Home Guard. The result of that union was Downriver, who finished second to Star Effort in the Gr1 Cape Fillies Guineas, then died later that season. Up The Creek bred 10 winners from 13 foals, but only one stakes winner, the colt Hard Test (Gr3 Clairwood Nursery; by Shoe Danzig). Her first three foals were bred by Oaklands, which staged a dispersal sale in 1991 where Up The Creek was knocked down at a sale-topping R600k, in foal to Northern Guest. Buyer was Norman Tilley’s National Turf Investments (NTI), breeder of her next five foals. She changed hands again, age 15, at the 1996 Natal Mare sale for R85k (where NTI also sold champion mares Tecla Bluff and Devon Air). Her last five foals were conceived at Summerhill Stud.
Legacy: Gr1 SA Fillies Guineas, Gr1 Garden Province S. (twice), Gr1 Paddock S.; Champion 3yo Filly
Bimbina
BIMBINA (ARG) (1982f - Francis U x Billie Dove by Victory Roll). Bred in Argentina at Haras America, Bimbina raced in the colours of Graham Beck and his wife Rhona, trained by Terence Millard. She won her maiden as a 3yo in October 1985, followed by 3 plate-race wins in quick succession. Regarded as her stable’s second string for the Gr1 Cape Fillies Guineas (contested as the Highlands Stud Classic) in January 1986, Bimbina upset her heavily fancied stable companion Ecurie (who started odds-on at 1/3), winning by half a length. As a member of her trainer’s raiding party taken to the Highveld for the autumn feature season, Bimbina was successful in the Gr2 Lancome Fillies handicap and Gr3 Helios Fillies Stakes in March and April. During the following Natal feature season she ran a short head second to Eileen Alanna in the Gr1 SA Fillies Guineas (with odds-on Ecurie unplaced). After that her form tapered off somewhat, perhaps not surprisingly after such an intense campaign. She was retired to her owner’s Highlands Stud following her 3yo season. Bimbina’s second career was a disappointment. She had a dozen foals, of which six won, none of them stakes performers. She was sold, carrying a West Man colt, for R30k at the Cape Mare Sale in 2000, and re-sold 2 years later at a mixed sale for just R12k, barren. The non-winning West Man colt of 2000 had been her final foal.
Legacy: Gr1 Cape Fillies Guineas
Up The Creek and 3yo stable companion Bimbina vied for top place on the betting boards, with Up The Creek eventually starting favourite at 22/10 - and she proved superior on the day. The 5yo mare surged to the front at the 200m marker and kept going to hold Velozia to a length, with Enchanted Garden a neck away in third place, three lengths ahead of Bimbina.
