I'm sure most of you have seen in recent news reports that the northern part of Europe has been experiencing one of its coldest winters in the past decade, with severe snowstorms battering Great Britain, Ireland and the Netherlands as well as my home country Germany over the past fortnight. The blizzards have not only caused nationwide traffic disruption, they have also had a serious impact on business activities in those countries.
My relatives and friends in Germany told me that last weekend the situation was especially bad with the whole country hit by snowstorms, causing parts of the autobahn to be closed and some rail services suspended. Passengers at Frankfurt International Airport were also affected as the runways were frozen over. But I'm pleased to hear that the weather has been getting a lot better over the past few days and the situation has gradually improved.
The cold snap has had a severe impact on sports schedules across Europe too, causing widespread postponements and cancellations. In England, where the jumps racing season is in full swing, numerous meetings have had to be abandoned as the racetracks were blanketed with snow, and even some of the flat races held on all-weather tracks. Football fans in Hong Kong will also know that many scheduled league and cup matches in England have also been postponed, as well as a few matches in France, either due to frozen pitches or to safety concerns for travelling spectators.
Although Hong Kong has also been affected by a cold spell recently, we are fortunate that conditions never get so severe here. It's encouraging to see that our racing fans have still turned out in large numbers to support their favourite sport, with our turnover exceeding HK$1 billion at Sha Tin last Sunday and HK$800 million at Happy Valley on Wednesday night. The investment on Wednesday's final race alone reached a remarkable HK$158 million, the highest figure for a single race at Happy Valley in several years. It's nice to see this strong momentum and I hope it can continue in the months to come.
It's especially good to see that our Jockey Challenge pool has become increasingly well-received among racing fans this season, with the total investment reaching HK$11 million last Sunday and over HK$8 million on Wednesday. I believe the surge in turnover is due to racing fans becoming more familiar with this fixed odds pool, and the fierce competition between our leading jockeys at recent meetings.
With Jockey Challenge growing in popularity, I've been receiving suggestions from many of you that the Club should expand fixed odds betting to ordinary pools, particularly on major occasions like pattern races. This is an issue we need to handle carefully, as the Club is in the position of operating and monitoring horse racing in Hong Kong, as well as providing the betting, so it's important to ensure that our racing customers do not perceive us to have any conflict of interest. But we will prudently study the feasibility of widening fixed odds betting, and see whether any extra options or improvements can be made in the future.
Anyway, there's more racing excitement available on the Sha Tin turf this afternoon and I hope you would continue to offer your support to those horses and jockeys you favour. Among the 10 races on the card, I will fancy the chance of King Dancer in the Peninsula Golden Jubilee Challenge Cup. This four-year-old horse performed nicely in his previous start at 2000m, but lacked a bit of luck as he was trapped for a few times in the straight. I expect there's a good pace in this cup event and I hope he can perform better today. However, he will have to beat recent performers like Super Satin, Moonwalk and outsider Osvaldo in this 1800m race.
For the Carnarvon Handicap, despite being drawn wide and taking his first start at 1400m, Enriched still won brilliantly in his last run. He will be competing at the same distance and again partnered by Douglas Whyte today. With there being not many frontrunners in this event, he may stay closer to the leaders and I hope he can produce another decent run today. But I wouldn't be surprised to see horses like Quelle Surprise, Winning Fellowship and Happy Tumbler staging a challenge to Enriched in this race.
Comment
