Trevor Armitage, a member of a top South African thoroughbred breeding family, died on Monday of leukemia just a few days after receiving an Equus Award for one of the best horses he had ever bred, the Dennis Drier-trained superstar mare Beach Beauty, who was named Champion Older Female.
The Armitage family’s Rathvale Stud, which was originally in Standerton, was founded by Trevor’s father Jim and has produced some fine horses, some of whom, like Gatecrasher and Home Guard, are part of South African racing folklore.
Trevor was fourteen years the junior of his brother Geoff, who left to farm tobacco in Zimbabwe in 1964.
Geoff subsequently started a thoroughbred breeding farm in Zimbabwe called Sandown Stud, which was Champion Breeder 24 times.
Trevor meanwhile stayed in South Africa as assistant to his father and later took over the farm.
He was described as a man who loved horses and his passion for racing was evident in that he was at one stage a steward at the now defunct Newmarket racecourse in Alberton, which was a long drive from Standerton.
Trevor, due to the increasingly dry seasons in Standerton, later moved the farm to its current location in Volksrust.
Latterly, he bought and sold cattle and only kept a few thoroughbred mares for breeding.
However, he had also become keen on buying weanlings and yearlings to race and had recently purchased two Dynasty fillies.
Gatecrasher was probably the most famous of the Rathvale Stud-bred horses.
In the eyes of his trainer Herman Brown Senior, the rangy chestnut was the greatest horse this country has seen.
He was unbeaten on left-handed tracks and his finest hour came when annihilating a field in the Met that included another great in Sledgehammer, whom he also beat easily in the subsequent Clairwood Champion Stakes over 1600m, despite going wrong just before the line and thus being forced into retirement.
Unfortunately, Gatecrasher had the habit of hanging to his left, so always had a problem negotiating right handed tracks.
As a result he had the Durban July taken away from him in the boardroom after crossing the line first, as he had interfered with the third-placed horse Distinctly.
The Armitages also produced the great Home Guard, who won his first eleven races, which is still a South African record.
Home Guard went on to become a Champion Sire.
One of the first top horses the Armitages produced was the 1951 Johannesburg Summer Handicap winner Nile Delta and others of note were Appointment, Sun Tonic, Shelter and Summer Line.
Rathvale Stud finished in the top ten in the National Breeders’ Championship eighteen times and were second to the invincible Birch Brothers on one occasion.
The family owe their careers in horseracing to the depression of the 1930s.
Geoff related that during that time his father had once trekked up to Johannesburg to sell a couple of Hereford Bulls that he had bred.
However, after refusing an offer of five pounds, he trotted them all the way home and sold them for three pounds apiece.
Consequently, he turned his attentions to thoroughbreds.
Trevor continued the family legacy until his last days, despite only having a handful of mares in the end.
Beach Beauty, who is by Dynasty, was born on his Volksrust farm and of all the horses he ever bred she could well have been the one closest to his heart as she was raced in honour of his late son Mark.
The Shanks Syndicate that race Beach Beauty was called after Mark’s nickname during his University days.
The syndicate consists of his widow Ruth as well as the best man at his wedding Warren Kidd and his wife Laura and former Gold Circle Chairman John Bescoby and his wife Janette.
The silks of the syndicate, red, with grey and black striped sleeves, green cap and navy blue peak, were knitted to resemble the colouring of the Narina Trogan as Mark, an avid ornithologist, had been particularly excited when finally getting a rare sighting of this elusive bird.
Beach Beauty was named by Mark’s daughter Kate.
She stamped herself as the probable best female racehorse in the country this year and the wonderful journey the syndicate have enjoyed will be continuing for at least another season.
However, Trevor’s passing will probably lead to them experiencing a double feeling of emotion when she next races.
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