While I’m writing this blog earlier today, I’ve watched how Hong Kong runner Mr Medici performs in the Group 1 Caulfield Cup through our live simulcast from Australia. As our racing season just began for a month, it’s certainly a bit difficult for a Hong Kong horse to take his season debut in an overseas mile-and-a-half event, but this consistent runner settled nicely behind the speed and finished sixth in this race. I hope his form will be improved after this run and I’ll see if his connections will give him a try in the Melbourne Cup at Flemington three weeks later.
In Hong Kong, we will be hosting the Sa Sa Ladies’ Purse Day race meeting tomorrow. In my personal view, I think this race meeting is a “talk-of-the-town event” of the early part of the season. Not only are there exciting races, there are also many ladies and gentlemen dressed up stylishly at the racecourse to echo the theme of beauty and elegance. This really gives the racing atmosphere a special boost, in the same way as other famous race meetings around the world like the Melbourne Cup in Australia and the Royal Ascot meeting in the UK.
The Sa Sa Ladies’ Purse Day has gained great popularity with Hong Kong people in recent years. For instance, last year more than 76,000 people came to Sha Tin for this meeting, many of them ladies who are not regular racegoers. Apart from the free door gift, the Club's special merchandise for this event and the beauty care demonstrations organised by the sponsors, cosmetics group Sa Sa International, always prove very popular.
The Ladies' Purse is one of Hong Kong's oldest-established races, dating back to 1846, and we still follow the tradition of inviting an unmarried lady to present a gold coin to the jockey, owner and trainer of the winning horse. This year, Hong Kong’s young equestrian rider Jasmine Lai will do the honours.
Those of you who follow equestrian news will likely be familiar with Jasmine's name. In August, she earned glory for Hong Kong by winning a silver medal in the equestrian team jumping event of the inaugural Youth Olympic Games in Singapore, which is the best result ever achieved by a Hong Kong youth rider at international level. Jasmine is one of the members of our Jockey Club Junior Equestrian Team and has been receiving professional training and competition experience in Europe with the Club's support, so it's very encouraging to see our efforts paying off.
I understand that Jasmine has just started university studies in the US, so she is making a special trip back to Hong Kong for the Ladies’ Purse Day tomorrow. She will continue to receive professional equestrian training in the US and I hope she and other promising young riders will continue to work hard and shine in equestrian sport in the future.
I would also like to offer my thanks to Sa Sa International, and in particular their Chairman Simon Kwok, for recently agreeing to extend their sponsorship of the Ladies’ Purse Day for a further five years. It has proved a very successful collaboration, and we will once again present an exciting range of themed on-course activities at Sha Tin this Sunday. All racegoers will receive a free sparkling horse brooch designed by Gaile Lai on admission to the racecourse, while stocks last, while ladyfolk who come stylishly dressed can contest our Best Hat Awards, and there are also special contests and make-up workshops. I hope you will find all these programmes very enjoyable.
For the 10 races on the programme, I think the Sa Sa Ladies’ Purse is a top class race which plenty of horses with a chance to win this race. The expected good to slow pace should suit Mighty High to take up the lead. Despite facing strong competition from classy runners such as Vaugirard, King Dancer and Blue Sky, Mighty High is still for me the horse to beat. Meanwhile, John Size’s Ride With The Wind is an upcoming horse that can give a challenge, while German import Irian will probably the horse as an outsider who can surprise all.
In the Soin d’eau Handicap, one of our top rising stars Little Bridge is running again and he appears to be the clear favourite in this race. The expected pace should be good to fast which is not of concern to him, but my only reservation is that it will be his first time to run over 1200m around a bend. I’ll see how he performs this time. Among his opponents, the in-form Bullish King produced an outstanding victory over the straight course of 1000m in his last start. Adding to Good Strike, who finished strongly in his seasonal debut last month, these two runners should be the main opponents to Little Bridge in this Class 2 event.
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