Igugu's victory in last weekend's J&B Met at Kenilworth was one of the most courageous performances seen on a South African racecourse in quite a while - and I'm surprised we haven't made more of a fuss of it.

I'm told the filly's tough, flinty, vastly experienced trainer, Mike de Kock, showed just a hint of trembly lip as he said he was "humbled" by Igugu's effort. She'd been just 90% ready for the contest, he conceded.

Perhaps it was the remoteness of the faraway, snowy land in which I searched for news of the Met, and maybe jetlag later at home, but I struggled to find any such expression of how remarkably moving this Met win was.

Pundits seem strangely lukewarm about it. They saw Igugu as the proverbial "certainty" for the Met, at the weights. So her late lunge to snatch the honours was in some way less than had been expected, some appeared to suggest.

But consider that she is a filly racing against colts - and it takes an exceptional female racehorse to beat a male (no joke, it truly does).

Then add: she suffered a bronchial infection during her preparation; she endured an 18-hour road trip to get from Johannesburg to Cape Town a week before the event; she was forced into a quarantine stable on her own for several days due to paranoia about African horse sickness; racing fundis whispered that she was not fit (even as the betting public punted their darling); she was sluggishly away at the start and was cut into early on; a muddled version of the favourite-sabotaging "Cape crawl" tactic was employed in the running, and she was well back as the field entered the finishing straight.

Reigning Durban July champions seldom win the Met, with immortals like Politician, London News and Pocket Power among the few.

Surely this victory puts Igugu in contention to be the best female thoroughbred to grace our turf.

Perhaps it is the mainstream media being more concerned with vapidly gushing about prancing celebs at the Met than reporting the day's true glory that leaves one feeling Igugu isn't being recognised as the sporting superstar she is. Igugu was born in Australia, but South Africans can take a lot of credit with a Zulu name meaning "treasure".

Trainer De Kock is principal among them. Another is co-owner Andre Macdonald, who bought the filly as a R1-million consolatory afterthought after being outbid at R2-million for the Aussie-bred youngster that he really wanted on that fateful sale.

Seldom mentioned is the man who plucked our heroine from under the noses of the Aussies.

Mooi River farmer Mick Goss went to Oz, selected and bought her, shipped her home and had Zulu horsemen raise and school her, and then sold her for a profit.

Dealing in horses this way is known as "pinhooking", so, to a few other accolades, Mick can add the title Pinhooker Extraordinaire.