I thoroughly enjoyed the highly entertaining National Day race meeting at Sha Tin yesterday, in particular the tremendously impressive performances of the winners of the Sha Tin Sprint Trophy and the National Day Cup – the first pattern races in our new racing season.
In the former race we saw Entrapment, who was sidelined for more than a year but was making his first start at pattern race level, successfully extending his unbeaten streak to eight in this 1,000m event. In my opinion it was an easy victory as when the horse was up front, his jockey Douglas Whyte just needed to whip lightly to remind him to keep up his speed. It was not a disappointing run though from our veteran Sacred Kingdom as he nearly overcame the factor of top weight, giving away 12 pounds to the winner and still showing nice acceleration late on. I’m very much looking forward to seeing how these two perform in the Cathay Pacific Jockey Club Sprint and in the Cathay Pacific Hong Kong Sprint in December.
If you agree with me that Entrapment’s victory was easy, I believe you would accept it’s no exaggeration to say Ambitious Dragon simply walked past his opponents in the National Day Cup. As I said in my blog yesterday, 1400m is definitely on the short side for the reigning Horse of the Year, and don’t forget we also had a few top milers in the race field. However, Ambitious Dragon really did win in such emphatic fashion, seemingly racing in a class of his own on his seasonal debut. It was an awesome performance, and I can’t wait to see how he performs when facing overseas opposition again in our international races in December.
Moving on to today, our Hong Kong duo Lucky Nine and Green Birdie will do battle this afternoon against Singapore sensation Rocket Man and top Japanese speedsters in the G1 Sprinters Stakes at Nakayama Racecourse. I understand that both Hong Kong runners have been looking very good in training since their satisfactory performances in the Centaur Stakes three weeks ago. So I believe in our simulcast, they will be really competitive when they go out on the Nakayama turf. Although I’m unavailable to attend the race, I still offer them my wholehearted support, and it would definitely be great if they were able to follow up Ultra Fantasy’s triumph last year, and so give back-to-back victories in this championship sprint to Hong Kong.
I think the good draw of 5 will make Rocket Man being the horse to beat. But Lucky Nine, being drawn to start from Gate 1, still has an outside chance to upset him. The Japanese horses are place chances for me, with Dasher Go Go should improve from his last run, and San Carlo the other place hope.
Please don’t forget we will also simulcast six G1 races from the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe race day from Longchamp, France, with the first of our simulcast races starting at 7.10pm HK time. There you can see whether Ryan Moore and Workforce can seek back-to-back victories in the Arc, as well as whether supermare Goldikova can grab her 15th G1 title in the Prix de la Foret. So please join me here in France and catch up the races through our live broadcast at then.
For the Arc race, Sarafina, who is likely to start as race favourite, has not drawn an ideal gate, but I still think she is the horse to beat. Snow Fairy loves the good going. Despite of her gate, she has a nice top-three chance. Workforce is not the horse for me he was last year. The watering of the track has made the track more acceptable to him, but he would prefer more give in the ground. Reliable Man will be ridden by Gerald Mosse, I like him more than another powerful contender So You Think, because Aidan O'Brien is not firing at the moment and I think he has never been as convincing in Europe as he was in Australia. Last but not least, another filly Galikova, half-sister to Goldikova, seems to improve all the time. From gate 4 she should be well positioned and would not surprise me as being in the finish.
Comment
