This week marks the end of the second month of a new racing season and already several things are clear both at home and abroad.
Joao Moreira is clearly determined to seize the champion jockey title back from Zac Purton after another Sha Tin treble took him ten clear at top of the table, while Tony Millard seems to have international plans for Elusive State after his latest impressive AW success in Sunday’s feature event.
And international racing remains a strong theme all over the world at the moment. Last year’s Hong Kong Vase runner-up Lys Gracieux enhanced her global reputation further with a thrilling success in Saturday’s Cox Plate at Moonee Valley and Almond Eye returned from a lengthy break to prove herself one of the world’s elite racehorses with a devastating defeat of a high-class field in Sunday’s Tenno Sho Autumn in Tokyo.
Connections of elite thoroughbreds have a wide range of choices in the closing months of the calendar year nowadays with Japan, the Breeders’ Cup and Australia’s Spring Carnival all offering numerous lucrative options.
It looks like this year’s Breeders’ Cup at Santa Anita will be missing a few star attractions this year including Aidan O’Brien’s star filly Magical, who has sadly been retired after being found to be running a temperature just before she was due to fly to California on Monday morning.
Late setbacks such as that mean it is always difficult to predict the shape of big-race fields ahead of time and the current situation in Hong Kong presents particular challenges this year.
However, Hong Kong racing fans can rest assured the Club will be doing all it can to ensure that the fields for this year’s LONGINES HKIR races are as strong as ever.
Almond Eye would clearly be a true star attraction if she joined the party and it was encouraging to hear her connections mention the Hong Kong Cup as a possible end-of-year option as they discussed future plans.
Tenno Sho runner-up Danon Premium is also entered for the Mile and the Cup on 8 December but last year’s historic clean sweep showed how strong the home team is and Sunday’s Sha Tin card will provide a strong reminder of that when our champion middle distance stayer Exultant makes his reappearance against four other G1 winners and the Derby winner Furore in what promises to be one of the best Sa Sa Ladies’ Purse contests for a long time.
The Class 3 Shek Uk Shan Handicap over 1800m is the final race on Wednesday night with a well matched field of 12, including Danny Shum-trained last-start winners Clement Legend and Owners’ Star.
Clement Legend was rated 24 one year ago and has since won six of his last nine races whilst spending much of his time at Conghua.
The pace will be good with Giant Turtle, Party Together and Jolly Gene setting the tempo. Tashidelek, Owners’ Star, Lucky Time and Clement Legend will be in the next group and the rest will come from the back.
Chefano is suited by the trip and the South African import, who was gelded in the off season, has found his form. He was badly held up in his last race yet was still beaten by only a length and three quarters. This could be the race where he breaks through for his first victory in Hong Kong and I make him a win and place chance.
Clement Legend and Owners’ Star are proven at the class and course, and will get good trips from just off the pace. Both are place chances.
Sichuan Dar is also a place chance following a strong effort when adding blinkers in his last start at Sha Tin. His best success has come at Happy Valley.
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