Mimi Voss’ Tizsilk, a nose winner of last year’s Charleston Cup, will seek a second victory in the featured race of the 19th annual Charleston Cup Races on Sunday, Nov. 11. A highly competitive and oversubscribed field was entered for the $25,000 Charleston Cup, a 2 1/4-mile optional allowance hurdle.
First post time is 1 p.m. for the five-race program at Stono Ferry Race Course in Hollywood, S.C.
A seven-year-old Tiznow gelding, Tizsilk will be making his first 2012 start over fences for trainer Tom Voss, the owner’s husband. Tizsilk’s come-from-behind victory last year gave Voss the advantage in a tight race for the 2011 trainer title by victories.
Since that thrilling victory, Voss has kept Tizsilk on the flat, where he has one win and a second in seven starts this year. Paddy Young, last year’s champion jockey, has the mount on Tizsilk.
Also making his first 2012 start over fences will be Sue Sensor’s Sunshine Numbers, an accomplished runner who has not started since a runaway victory in the 2011 Carolina Cup at Camden, S.C. Trained in Camden by Arch Kingsley, Sunshine Numbers was the champion New York-bred steeplechase horse in 2009 and 2010.
Entering the Charleston Cup from a third-place finish in Aiken Fall’s $25,000 Budweiser Holiday Cup allowance hurdle is Over Creek Stables’ Arrakis. Trained by Julie Gomena, the Royal Academy gelding had won a maiden claiming hurdle at the Foxfield Fall Races on Sept. 30. Roddy Mackenzie has the mount.
The Charleston Cup also attracted the Holiday Cup’s fourth finisher, Westerly Farm’s Class Classic. Trainer Lilith Boucher named her husband, veteran jockey Richard Boucher, to ride.
Randleton Farm’s Duc de Savoie enters the Charleston Cup from a sixth-place finish in the $75,000 Foxbrook Champion Hurdle for novices on Oct. 20 at Far Hills, N.J. Trainer Jimmy Day named Jeff Murphy to ride the Randleston homebred.
Aiken Fall maiden winners looking to step up in the Charleston Cup are Jeremy Gillam’s Happy Digger and Magalen O. Bryant’s Happy Digger.
The Charleston Cup is limited to ten starters, and the race attracted a full complement of horses on an also-eligible list. They will draw into the race if any withdrawals occur. Among them is Bryant’s Air Maggy, who was nipped at the wire by Tizsilk in last year’s Charleston Cup.
