Pune: The eagerly awaited and prestigious SA Poonawalla Million (Grade 3) and Villoo C Poonawalla Million race is all set to get underway at Pune Race Course on Sunday. 

The prestigious races have always drawn an unbelievable response and it will be no different this time. The Poonawalla Group sponsored ‘Million’ is dedicated by Dr Cyrus and Zavaray Poonawalla in memory of their father, late Soli. A Poonawalla, a legendary breeder, owner and guiding force behind them and the racing industry in India.

The Poonawalla group has always strived hard to make this a very successful event and time and again they have done their utmost to make this day a mixture of fun and fortune for many a racegoer who comes to the course. 

The Poonawalla brothers are the owners of India’s top rated stud farm — The Poonawalla Stud Farms, Pune. They own some of the country’s top colts and fillies too, which are racing at all centres. 

This Sunday, SA Poonawalla Multi Million will witness some of the top rated horses vying for the trophy with the Dalls Todywalla trained Excellent going out as the piping hot favourite. 

At the acceptance stage, there were 35 runners left in and now it will be down to just seven, as Excellent seems to have scared all. 

Racegoers at the Pune racecourse, who correctly nominate horses that come first, second, third and fourth, will be eligible for the bumper prize, which is a Hyundai Eon Car. 

Apart from the car, the other prizes are LED TV or a laptop. The winners will be decided by a draw and in case there are more than three winners, there will also be consolation prizes dished out by the sponsors. 

The contest forms for ‘The Free Contest Of Skill’ will be given to each racegoer at the turnstiles of all the enclosures of the Pune race course and it must be noted that this exciting contest is meant only for racegoers on 
Sunday. Participants, who will get a free contest form, will have to correctly nominate the first four horses in the order of finishing in the SA Poonawalla Multi-Million.

Three horses fancied are Excellent Times (3-3), Costa Brava (5-2) and Valegro (7-13). 

Brief History

• The race is named after Late Soli A Poonawalla, an ardent lover of clean horse racing, one amongst the pioneers of thoroughbred breeding in India and father of Dr Cyrus and  Zavaray S Poonawalla. He stepped into breeding race horses in 1946 when the industry was in its infancy.
• As they say, when obsessive passion fans a strong desire to create pioneering work, success follows rather quickly, and Flying Red brought glory to the Poona Stud Farm in its very first year by winning the 2000 Guineas. That he missed the derby narrowly two months later, in retrospect, should be considered a blessing in disguise because the never-say-die spirit within Soli Poonawalla propelled him further on the path of excellence, and today, the Poona Stud Farm has grown into The Poonawalla Stud Farms and has gone on to win a record tally of 339 Classics, an unofficial world record, including nine Indian Derbies, five in a row, and 14 Indian Turf lnvitation Cups. By any standard, that’s an astounding achievement.
• The farm is divided into two separate units - the youngstock division situated at Hadapsar and the breeding division located at Theur, about 10 km and 24 km from Pune, respectively. At present, the stud farm stands approximately 140 broodmares and 3 stallions - Arazan, Ace and the latest addition to the stallion roster, the very exciting Group 1 St. James’s Palace Stakes winner Excellent Art.
• The majority of the yearlings produced each year are sold through private sale with the Poonawalla family retaining a handful for racing. All the stallions to stand at Poonawalla Stud Farm have restored the faith instilled in them by the Poonawalla brothers by consistently producing classic horses and ranking at the top of the leading stallion charts.
• For his life long contribution to Indian Breeding and Racing, the RWITC, after his demise, instituted “The S A Poonawalla Trophy” in the year 1982. The race was upgraded to Grade 3 status in 1986 and to Grade 2 in 1990. It was in the year 1996 that the race was further upgraded to a Million race and was named the SA Poonawalla “Astonish” Million to commemorate the first ever- victory of an Indian thoroughbred on a foreign race track when the Poonawalla Stud Farms-bred Astonish returned to India after the historic achievement at Sha Tin in Hong Kong.
• The popularity and the importance of this race then grew by leaps and bounds, necessitating an upgrade to the Multi-Million status in 2009. The race is now known as S. A. Poonawalla Million (Grade 3).   
• The race has invariably drawn huge crowds because of various activities. People from all walks of life throng to the race course not only to watch the top of the line thoroughbreds racing at their best, but also to be a part of the glitz and glamour which abounds on the day.