Pune: The love for the sport of horse racing keeps CD Katrak going this long as he comes from a family whose life revolved around horses for decades.
It has been a wonderful journey for one of the best trainer in India, as he has proved time and again that when a horse is handed over to him Katrak almost always delivered
desired results.
Sakal Times caught up with the trainer-par excellence and Katrak spoke about his journey remedies needed to revive horse racing which finds itself in critical situation.
“It has been nearly 39 years since I have been training horses. Prior to that I was an assistant to Dara Pandole for about 18 months. We all came from horsing family meaning my uncle was a trainer and another uncle was a big owner, who used to own horses with Rashid Bryamji.
“He had a lot of good horses in those days and won a lot of big races and classics, and he used to train with Rashid Bryamji,”
Katrak explained.
“In the good old days, racing was completely different to what it is now. We used to have the best of jockeys from all over the world riding here and the game was highly competitive but now in the last 6-7 years is has become less competitive. There are less good jockeys coming from abroad to ride because of all kinds of restrictions imposed on them. And if good jockeys and professionals are not there then the competition becomes much less interesting. We would like a lot more competition. We would like more foreign boys coming in because they are really top class riders and if they ride with our Indian boys, the quality of our Indian boys would improve,” Katrak said.
“I would say Venus Arising and Moonlight Romance were my two best classic horses. I did have a lot of top class sprinters like Oasis Star, Indiscretion and others but these two were amongst the best. I had some really nice horses, I had a great career and great innings as far as I am concerned,”
Katrak reflected.
