I believe many of you will have stayed with us until the early hours of this morning for our Dubai World Cup simulcast, and I’m sure you were as thrilled watching at home as I was in Meydan to see our Hong Kong runners doing so well in one of the most important race meetings in the world. We enjoyed a sensational evening with Amber Sky winning the Al Quoz Sprint, followed by Sterling City and Rich Tapestry demonstrating their dominance in the Dubai Golden Shaheen with a one-two finish.
It was a fantastic night of racing and entertainment, and the performance of the Hong Kong horses was outstanding with two wins and one second making Hong Kong the leading nation in the "Horse Olympics Medal Table" in Dubai with Japan second. It was another example of the strength of Asian racing, which in my opinion is still not recognised widely enough around the world.
In fact when I chatted with the Hong Kong racing media last week, I hoped we could notch a double in Meydan this time. Frankly speaking, I wasn’t sure that Hong Kong runners could repeat the same feat as we managed on SIA Cup day in Singapore last year – winning two Group 1s in a day, including a quinella finish in one of them – that soon. But of course it’s a wonderful achievement with the eyes of the racing world on Dubai this weekend. These successes confirmed the credentials of our best horses and leading horsemen on the world stage.
I would like to congratulate the winning owners, Mr Sammo Hung of Amber Sky and Mr Ling Chiu Shing and Mr Gary Ling of Sterling City on their immense success.
Hong Kong horses dominated in the two sprint races but the Dubai World Cup meeting showed we have not only world class speedsters. Dominant's performance in the 2410m Dubai Sheema Classic was very good, especially taking into consideration the interference he faced during the race. Amber Sky is in my opinion the best horse in the world over the straight 1000m. The quinella of Sterling City and Rich Tapestry was the icing on the cake and it would have been an even tighter finish between the two if Rich Tapestry had received a more favourable draw.
It was not only the night of the Hong Kong horses but also the night of the Hong Kong-based jockeys and trainers. Joao Moreira produced the outstanding riding performance of the day, and it was very satisfying to see that besides John Moore, who is a world class professional, we had our local talents Ricky Yiu, and a relative newcomer on the International scene Michael Chang, doing Hong Kong proud.
The performances of the two Japanese winners were outstanding too. Just A Way looked in a different class to his rivals in the Dubai Duty Free and Gentildonna overcame not only one but at least three traffic jams in the straight to win going away in the Dubai Sheema Classic.
My own horse Now We Can was a little bit unlucky having to overcome his wide draw and being a little bit keen in the lead but the decision of our jockey to "surrender" the lead at the end of the back straight and hope that in the straight he would be able to slip through on the rail was a decision which did not work out at all. When the race really got going in the straight he never got a clear passage, sitting behind a horse which was already beaten, and he could not get out until the 200m when the race was already decided.
Overall it was a truly memorable evening for the Hong Kong team. I’m delighted that we have so many talented horses in our ranks and I look forward to seeing them delivering similar success on our home turf as well as on foreign soil in the near future.
While you are still reflecting upon the performances of the Hong Kong runners in Dubai, you can enjoy more thrilling racing action from our 10 races at Sha Tin today. Apart from the HKG3 Premier Plate, we will also bring you another overseas simulcast, this time the G1 Takamatsunomiya Kinen from Japan. I hope you all will enjoy the racing action.
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