KARACHI: The horse-racing connoisseurs returned home with peanuts as rank outsiders swept a small three-race card in the winter Gymkhana race meeting at the Karachi Racecourse on Saturday.

Unknown pedigree bay horse Tip Top pulled off a major upset when he edged mare Duran Duran by three quarter-of-a-length to clinch the day’s feature event — scale order II, III and IV gone over four-and-a-half lengths.

Tip Top was placed second, five lengths behind Queen’s Best in its preceding run on Feb 2 and the punters were not expecting the horse to open new year’s account. This was its sixth appearance in as many racing weeks of 2019.

Bay horse Native Prince lagged two lengths behind to grab third place as odds on favourite Sweet Victory hugely disappointed the race-goers by completing the frame further eight lengths away among seven starters.

It was the third and last race of the days programme.

A race earlier, dark bay mare Paris shocked public fancy Second Life registering an exciting five-length victory to land the supporting race — scale order V, VI and VII contested over four-and-a-half furlongs and making it two on trot.

Paris was piloted home by rider Wasim, who ended the day with an excellent double his other winner being Tip Top.

Black Smoke fell back two-and-a-half lengths away to occupy third place followed by Sonia Again.

I Gold was withdrawn before the race to leave seven horses in fray.

At the outset, with no form worth Aas Pass sprang a big surprise galloping to three-length and-a-quarter victory over mare Sassy Gold as favourite mare Blue Revenue had to be content with third place being edged by head.

Sharapova completed the frame another half-a-length behind among five starters.

Results:

THE FEBRUARY PLATE SCALE ORDER VIII — 4 F:

Aas Pass (Muntazir Mehdi) 7-10 (cr8-4), Nazil Hussain 1; Sassy Gold 7-10 (cr7-8), Ali Ehsan 2; Blue Revenue 8-11 (cr8-8), Shahzad Gul 3; Jawad Prince 9-0 (cr8-4), Ali Raza II 4.

Won by 3¼ L, Head, ½ L. Time: 0.54 1/5 seconds. Winner trained by Sher Mohammad.

THE FEBRUARY PLATE SCALE ORDER V, VI & VII — 4½ F:

Paris (Akbar Ali) 7-8 (cr7-11), Wasim 1; Second Life 7-12, Zaki Zakir 2; Black Smoke 8-4, Shahzad Gul 3; Sonia Again 7-4 (cr7-7), Ali Ehsan 4.

Won by 5 L, 2½ L, ½ L. Time: 0.59 1/5 seconds. Winner trained by Mohammad Mazhar.

THE FEBRUARY PLATE SCALE ORDER II, III & IV — 4½ F:

Tip Top (Nasim) 7-8 (cr7-12), Wasim 1; Duran Duran 7-6, Zaki Zakir 2; Native Prince 8-10, Zohaib Qamar 3; Sweet Victory 9-8, Mohammad Manzoor 4.

Won by ¾ L, 2 L, 8 L. Time: 0.59 2/5 seconds. Winner trained by owner.

Published in Dawn, February 10th, 2019