I hope you've all had a smooth and enjoyable start to the New Year. The past few days have been quite eventful for many of us in the Club. This includes five teams of Club runners, comprising of 54 members coming from different Club departments, who took part in Run With Your Heart 2010 at the Hong Kong Sports Institute on New Year’s Eve, a charitable event being sponsored by the Club for the fourth consecutive year.
Last Thursday, the day before the main relay run, a few of our apprentice jockeys including Derek Leung, Ben So, Vincent Ho and Keith Yeung also participated in a pre-event charity race, along with a group of China's Olympic gold medallists and some top local athletes. Taking part, too, were some "regeneration warriors", all of whom are chronic illness patients. By supporting this meaningful charity event, we hope to promote a sporting atmosphere among local people, at the same time as helping raise funds for the needy and destitute.
It was also a great start to 2011 for Hong Kong horse racing, as more than 30,000 racing fans attended our New Year’s Day race meeting and the day’s betting turnover topped HK$1.13 billion. This was the highest turnover so far this season, despite the fact that we refunded about HK$58 million to our customers following the late scratchings of Pretty One and White Jade.
I was even happier to see a few of our young prospects deliver good performances on the Sha Tin turf. Prominent among them were Little Bridge and Let Me Fight in the day’s trophy race, the Hong Kong Group 3 Chinese Club Challenge Cup. This was the first Group success of Little Bridge’s career and he achieved it in impressive style. Once he found daylight, he showed great turn of foot to break clear of the pack, then never looked back.
Little Bridge now has six wins from eight starts and on the showing of this race, he looks well capable of staying further and handling a mile. I look forward to seeing how he performs in the Mercedes-Benz Hong Kong Classic Mile on 23 January and the rest of the four-year-old series this season.
Another young runner who delivered an impressive performance was British import Xtension – runner-up in the final race of the day. Although he was held up early in the race and reached the home straight in a disadvantageous position, lying third last and one off the rail, he still managed to produce a strong chase from inside the pack for his second placing. He will be another horse I shall be keeping a close eye on in the four-year-old series this season.
Apart the success of these rising stars in Hong Kong, there's been some good news from Germany to start the New Year, as Andreas Suborics, a familiar name to our local racing fans, rode three winners on Sunday at Dortmund Racecourse in the western part of the country.
Many of you will remember that Andreas rode as a Club jockey in Hong Kong last season before sustaining serious head injuries during Sha Tin trackwork in March, which required him to undergo brain surgery. After his discharge from hospital some weeks later, he returned to Germany for recovery and rehabilitation, and declared his riding career at an end in August.
In recent months, though, his condition has improved a lot faster than expected, prompting him to resume riding from New Year’s Eve onwards. It makes me feel very happy to see this three-time German champion jockey make such a flying start with a treble. I hope his success will continue in 2011, and look forward to seeing him ride again on our home turf one day.
Some of our leading contenders in the 1O1O Million Challenge, such as Bolero, Absolute Hedge and Ottimo, will be back on parade in our racing at Happy Valley tonight. Including tonight’s programme, there are still seven meetings before this popular Valley concludes next month, so I expect to be seeing some very competitive races there in the coming weeks.
Our handicapping team has made the three Triple Trio legs tonight really challenging, to ensure those who want to win the HK$6.6 million Jackpot have to work hard. In the Lok Wah Handicap, I think the expected good pace would give every starter a fair chance, with Superior Warrior in the lead and he is for me a horse who has a good chance to run close in this race. From Gate 1, Noble de Best should be in the finish. Resurging veteran Dream Horse and the in-form Rare Treasure are the other key contenders in this six-furlong event.
The Kai Yip Handicap is expected to be run at a good pace, too. My favourite is Diamond Knight with Maxime Guyon coming out of Gate 3, even the horse has not won in his 21 starts in Hong Kong. Let’s see if he can make a breakthrough this evening. Fresh Air is my second choice coming back to his winning distance of 1000m, and Free And Easy out of Gate 4 is a good chance for me, too.
The Ko Yee Handicap, the last leg of the Triple Trio, is a great finale with an expected good pace again. Lucky Bravo is currently the tote favourite and cannot be ignored, but I like Bolero most as he has developed to become a 1200m Happy Valley specialist. Coming out of Gate 4, Olivier Doleuze stays with him despite had the chance to ride Grand Dragon which is another good chance. I would be interested to see how Bolero performs tonight. Having said that, I would not leave out Forever Elation, as it would be ridden by Guyon and the horse’s trainer Andreas Schutz is enjoying some good form this season.
Comment
