(AP) If you had your money on Shiekabner\u2019s<\/B> sleek Pulpit colt, Duke Of New York, <\/B>in the G2 Coalmine Cup, you collected your winnings, but you may not have survived the heart attack. The scene of this heart-pounding spectacle was held on the beautifully manicured turf course in grand Victoria, before a packed house of very enthusiastic race fans.<\/P>
A field of seven three-year-old colts broke smoothly from the gate in the $250k one-mile turf featured race. First to show was Opinora\u2019s<\/B> even-money favorite Rock Ballad, <\/B>and the grade-one winning son of Seeking The Gold quickly rocketed to the front to establish the early lead. From the inside post Zalduendo Stables<\/B> grey colt, Bannaby, <\/B>was the only one able to keep in touch with the heavy favorite, but even he wasn\u2019t able to completely keep up with the streaking front runner. The eventual winner, Duke Of New York, settled into fifth place in the early stages, just inside of Ebony Poll and Drill Sergeant, about six lengths behind the leader. <\/P>
Approaching the half-mile pole the race took a completely unexpected turn. The crowd gasped as the heavy favorite Rock Ballad put up absolutely no resistance as he was easily passed on the inside by the flying Bannaby. The son of Unbridled\u2019s Song quickly opened up a three-length lead as he reached the top of the stretch, and he looked to be almost home free. It was clear to all that the only one with any chance to catch the streaking leader was the late charging Duke Of New York, and at this time even his chances seemed dim at best. <\/P>
Into the stretch the two straining colts hurtled, with Duke Of New York making up ground by the smallest of margins with each stride. At the eighth pole the lead was cut to just over one-length, and inside the sixteenth marker the margin had been sliced to a neck lead for the tenacious grey. With the crowds roar reaching a crescendo the battling duo hit the wire as a team, with no one sure who had won. It took the camera several minutes before Duke Of New York\u2019s number went up to an explosion of cheers by his backers. The crowd gave both exhausted warriors a well-deserved ovation. Tenpin8 Stables Dancing Tenpin<\/B> closed from well back to finish a non-threatening third, almost five lengths behind the winner. <\/P>
Duke Of New York is campaigned by Shiekabner, which is a division of the Kingab Stables. The fire red son of Pulpit was winning for the seventh time in twelve lifetime starts. The Coalmine Cup was his second stakes win and his first black type attempt. The 112-speed figure he posted was the highest of his career. He now has almost $300k in his bank account, and if he continues to improve it certainly won\u2019t be his last. <\/P>
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Pulpit colt bests Bannaby in the shadow of the wire<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":396,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4916","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-previews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4916","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/396"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4916"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4916\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4916"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4916"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4916"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}