With only eight meetings left in the 2020/21 Hong Kong season, the final twists and turns in another incredible 12-month period of high-class racing are about to unfold and two very distinct trends seem certain to figure.
The battle for supremacy in the trainers’ championship between triple winner Caspar Fownes and 11-time champion John Size threatens to go right down the wire ahead of the final meeting of the season on Wednesday 14 July.
John’s effort to produce two debut winners in Blaze Warrior and Dashing Fit at Sha Tin last Sunday leaves him only two wins adrift of Caspar – 69 to 67 – and there is everything to play for with Frankie Lor (60) also lingering within striking distance.
Both John and Caspar are extremely competitive by nature and, as we have seen this season with the lead changing hands on several occasions, neither will be prepared to concede until the very last.
On Sunday (13 June), the importance of Conghua Racecourse, with all its wonderful amenities, was clearly sheeted home with eight of the 11 Sha Tin winners having been stabled at CRC before their most recent performances last weekend.
Seven different trainers – John Size (two), Tony Cruz, Me Tsui, Benno Yung, Dennis Yip, Jimmy Ting and Douglas Whyte – were able to successfully capitalise on Conghua’s relaxed environs with gallopers who obviously appreciated the change in surroundings.
Remarkably, four of the eight winners prevailed on debut – California Spangle, Blaze Warrior, Dashing Fit and the five-year-old Bulb Pals, who spent a total of 19 months at Conghua under Dennis Yip’s direction as he overcame injury before winning in spectacular fashion.
In all, 146 horses have notched 173 wins from 757 races this season in Hong Kong immediately after being stabled at the world-class Conghua facility with a strike rate of 22.85 percent.
The most successful handlers so far this season have been Caspar Fownes (25), Frankie Lor (23), Francis Lui (17) and Tony Cruz, John Size and Me Tsui – all with 15.
The start of Royal Ascot on Tuesday night was a cause for celebration – on and off the track – for horse racing purists everywhere as crowds returned in glorious weather to the famous meeting for the first time since the pandemic started in 2020.
Palace Pier, the highest-ranked horse in the LONGINES World’s Best Racehorse standings, set the standard from the outset with victory in the G1 Queen Anne Stakes under Frankie Dettori before Cieren Fallon and Roger Teal upset Battaash in the G1 King’s Stand Stakes with Oxted. The third of the G1 contests – the St James’s Palace Stakes – witnessed a devastating show of dominance by Jim Bolger’s Poetic Flare under Kevin Manning.
With such fantastic racing on display, simulcast turnover in Hong Kong reached a record HK$340.4 million – up HK$68.3 million on the corresponding meeting last year, more evidence of the World Pool’s immense appeal.
By way of comparison, World Pool and simulcast turnover at Royal Ascot eclipsed the previous record of HK$332.7 million, which was set at the 2021 Dubai World Cup meeting in March.
The World Pool allows customers from racing jurisdictions around the globe to bet on Win, Place, Quinella Place and Tierce with the greater liquidity and greater surety of odds – a formula which is proving increasingly popular around the world.
Evidence of this is found in a host of records: year on year commingling turnover grew by 77 percent; commingling provided almost 30 percent of total wagering across all pools; year on year local turnover in Hong Kong was up 11.4 percent and year on year total turnover was up 25 percent.
Action continues at the Royal meeting tonight with the staging of the G1 Prince Of Wales’s Stakes (2003m), one of Europe’s elite 10-furlong contests. Slated as the fourth race at 11.20pm (Hong Kong time), this year’s contest features the clash between Aidan O’Brien’s Armory and Love following the scratching of Lord North.
A last start G2 winner at Chester, Armory is currently well in the market for Seamie Heffernan, but Ryan Moore has been aboard Love in four of her six victories and, given the English horseman’s proven affinity with the Irish filly, it is unsurprising she has claimed outright favouritism.
There is no racing at Happy Valley tonight in deference to Royal Ascot, but there is much to look forward to at Sha Tin on Sunday (20 June) with the staging of the G3 Premier Plate Handicap (1800m) and the G3 Premier Cup Handicap (1400m), which features the rematch of BMW Hong Kong Derby winner Sky Darci and Happy Healthy, who recently shared a stirring battle in the G3 Lion Rock Trophy Handicap (1600m) on 30 May.
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