Longines - A Grand Prize
WORLDTEMPUS - 5 September 2011
Though Andrasch Starke raced on a total of nine different horses in nine of the ten races that took place yesterday as the exciting close to a wonderful week in Iffezheim / Baden-Baden, I kept betting on him in the wrong races. Starke, you see, won the race that counted, though not the race that I thought he would win after listening to experts in horse racing expound upon the recent past of the jockeys, horses, and trainers taking part in yesterday's Grosser Preis von Baden. This sixth and final day of racing on the Iffezheim track closed with a bang.
It was indeed Andrasch took the podium, triumphant on Danedream, in the race in which Longines offered a total of 250,000 euros and the prize of honor to the winners.
The Iffezheim week is a highpoint of the social calendar in the German state of Baden in addition to being the most important event on Germany's horse racing calendar. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that there is a grand prix ball to celebrate the sporting occasion. Longines, the event's timing partner, also took guests to the Saturday evening gala event emceed by German actor Sky du Mont ("Der Schuh des Manitou") and during which Gloria Gaynor ("I Will Survive") sang her hits.
If Longines had only been able to predict exactly which race Starke was going to win, I would have been able to partake more fully in the whole "grand prix" experience, though. Shouldn't there be a watch for that? Unfortunately, the Dolce Vita - the official watch of the Grosser Preis von Baden-Baden - wasn't quite outfitted with this function.