South Africa’s racing operators, Gold Circle and Phumelela, have launched a new round of their popular “Star” series of competitions for horse owners, trainers, jockeys and Media tipsters with a total of R700 000 in prizes up for grabs.

The Turfstar competition is for horse owners and trainers whose horses are monitored in the competition races and carries a R400 000 prize for the winning owner and R100 000 for the winning trainer.

The Topstar competition is for jockeys and carries total prize money R100 000 split on a R60 000, R30 000 and R10 000 basis for the three riders earning the most number of points during the season.

The Tipstar competition is for Media tipsters and has the same prize allocations as the jockey series with tipsters earning points according to the accuracy of their published selections for the qualifying feature events run during the season.

The Turfstar and Topstar competitions are based on the finishing positions of horses with points of 12, 6, 4, 2 and 1 being allocated for the first five officially placed horses in the 31 Grade 1 and two Grade 2 races on which the competitions are run.

In the Tipstar competition, tipsters are required to select what they think will be the first four official finishing positions in each race. They will earn points on the basis of 12, 6, 4 and 2 for selecting the runners in the correct finishing positions. A bonus of two points will be earned for any selection which does not finish in the position nominated but finishes in the first four.

In addition, a Tip For Charity Competition has also been introduced and participating tipsters will have to nominate a bet for each of the feature meetings, based on their selections. The bet will be made through a special R500 betting account opened for each tipster and at the end of the season any profits in the account will be donated to a charity on behalf the tipster and the publication represented.

The competition gets under way with the running of the R2.5-million, Grade 1 Gommagomma Summer Cup over 2 000 metres at Turffontein on Saturday, November 26. It will run through all the qualifying graded features staged in Gauteng, the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal ending with the R500 000, Grade 1 Canon Gold Cup over 3 200 metres at Greyville on August 5 next year.

Progress reports on the competitions will be published periodically throughout the season. The Tipstar progress reports will be posted on www.tabgold.co.za and www.goldcircle.co.za websites prior to each nominated race and the overall winners will be announced and receive their prizes at the Canon Gold Cup meeting.