The government had a small win and Jockey Club officials were "cautiously optimistic" on the opening day of the racing season at Sha Tin yesterday, reports the Racing Post HK (www.racing.scmp.com).

It says: Attendance was down by around 2,000, but it was a sweltering day. Betting turnover more than held its own with last year's "pre-financial-crisis" figure.

"Last year, opening day was probably before the crisis hit, so to have a day with that level of betting turnover - even up by a little over HK$2 million - is a result we are very pleased with," club chief executive Winfried Engelbrecht-Bresges said. "As far as the crowd was concerned, I think today was as expected. Our restaurants were all booked out, and those people came. I think the hot weather was a big turn off and to get 49,000 people to come out in these conditions was a pretty good result. The turnover showed that those people who did stay away took advantage of our convenient betting channels instead."

The club's share of the HK$833 million turnover yesterday was the same as last year, at HK$38 million. However, the government's take in betting duty was up slightly - from HK$100 million on opening day last year to HK$102 million.

"The sporting spectacle of the racing was very good, the atmosphere was good and I'm cautiously optimistic about the season before us," Engelbrecht-Bresges said. "With our five extra meetings this season, I am anticipating an increase of around 3 per cent in our full season turnover and this is a pleasing start."

Two of the trainers who regularly feature on the first day of the season, John Moore and Tony Cruz, carved up six of the 10 races between them, but it was Almond Lee Yee-tat who received the afternoon's trophy from Donald Tsang Yam-kuen after Nightlign upstaged the top stables in a thrilling three-way finish to take the HKSAR Chief Executive's Cup. The day kicked off with a lion dance featuring 125 "lions" - symbolic of the 125-year anniversary being celebrated by the Jockey Club this year.

John Moore has always been one of the trainers to watch on opening day and kept his record intact with a three-timer that tipped his first-day winning percentage over 20 per cent in recent years, reports the Racing Post in Hong Kong.

It says: "Well, that's a percentage that I'd love to be able to keep all season," he laughed after stable rider Darren Beadman landed Sunny Smiles and Holey Dollar, and Moore "borrowed" apprentice Derek Leung Ka-chun from Paul O'Sullivan to bring home Sea Prince in the last race. "It's always nice to get a good start and we've managed to keep up the stable tradition today."

Sunny Smiles was having his first run for Moore after a stable transfer and the trainer said the drop to Class Five and the fact that he had been able to get some more muscle onto the gelding's frame had paved the way to the Flying Spur gelding's second win in 18 starts.

"The public had probably lost some confidence in Sunny Smiles but he was carrying a bit more bulk than previously and he had showed a little change of gears in his work that made him look pretty well placed in the lowest grade," Moore said. "There were a few worries for Darren at the 350m but he managed to get him clear and Sunny Smiles showed enough turn of foot to get through and win."

Holey Dollar is another relatively recent acquisition for Moore, too, after failing to fire for Andreas Schutz, and his manners have only improved marginally with Moore.

All Time High may have failed to salute the judge in 34 appearances, but the addition of blinkers could have the desired result when the gelding contests the final leg of Sunday's HK$20 million Triple Trio, which starts the new season with a bang at Sha Tin, reports the HK Racing Post.

It says: The Tony Cruz-trained seven-year-old put the writing on the wall when leading all the way to win a barrier trial on August 25 in impressive fashion. Under Matthew Chadwick, the gelding should be able to find the front with a minimum of fuss and be the one they all have to catch, with his toughest opposition likely to come from Fly Me To The Moon, Star Of Fame, Fun Rider and Record High.

The opening leg is brimming with talent, but the best banker looks to be highly promising sprinter Tuscan Spirit. The John Size-trained four-year-old put together four wins on the trot in impressive fashion, before failing at his last appearance when found to have an irregular heart rhythm. He showed he was back in business when trialling smartly 10 days ago and he should now be able to get his career back on track.

Main dangers are Medic Power, Brilliant Chapter, Dynamic Blitz and Nightlign. The middle pin is clearly the tricky part, but the safest banker option appears to be Divine Kid from a good draw.

Hong Kong trainers Almond Lee and Paul O'Sullivan believe that the NZ-bred gallopers Nightlign (NZ) (Align) and Fortune Spirit (NZ) (Danzighill) appear to hold their best chances of getting the new season off to a winning start on Sunday, 13 September at Sha Tin. The trainers revealed this information to racing fans at a pre-season roadshow held by the HKJC earlier this week.

Nightlign (NZ), trained by Lee will step out in the Class 1 The Hksar Chief Executive's Cup over 1200m, and will be ridden by South African jockey Jeff Lloyd. Nightlign (NZ), the 2007/08 New Zealand Champion Two-Year-Old-of-the-Year, arrived in Hong Kong with a perfect three from three race record.

By Align, Nightlign (NZ) proved his competitiveness with a debut class one win, and has since added three HK.3 placings to his race resume. Paul O'Sullivan will send his leading charge, Fortune Spirit (NZ), postward in the Class 4 Quarry Bay Handicap over 1400m. Fortune Spirit (NZ) won his only NZ start at Riccarton in 2008 before his export to Hong Kong.

Hong Kong's impact on the HK$16.8 million Sprinters Stakes has been strengthened with trainer John Size confirming Enthused will join Sacred Kingdom in the October 4 Group One event in Tokyo. The penultimate leg of the Global Sprint Series sees the world's joint-rated top sprinters, Sacred Kingdom and Scenic Blast, square up and Enthused will strengthen the Hong Kong challenge, despite not having run since an out-of-character second-last in the Queen's Silver Jubilee Stakes at his most recent run last March.

"It was the only time he's been out of the first five in 20 runs here so it wasn't his usual form and I think he was just tired," said Size (pictured) yesterday in confirming the Nakayama trip. "We have found nothing else. He's had a decent spell since that run and it would have been nice to race him before Japan to be sure and to know he's firing but we don't have that option."

Size said he would look for further guides in Enthused's trackwork and a barrier trial before he makes the trip, but said "at this stage, we're making plans to go and Douglas Whyte will ride him".

(www.racing.scmp.com)

It's all about problems, puzzles and challenges as the Jockey Club sheds the annual burden of an US$8 billion tax guarantee to begin a bright new era next Sunday at Sha Tin, reports Alain Aitken in the HK Racing Post.

His report adds: The removal of that guarantee after the agreed three seasons offers new freedoms to adjust the club's business model, offer new products and maximise returns to the government and community, but that freedom carries a responsibility for the future.

"This year marks the Jockey Club's 125th anniversary, which is something to celebrate, but also a starting point for securing the next 125 years," Chief Executive Winfried Engelbrecht-Bresges said this week. "We have a master plan, to be presented to the board for approval in December, and that will involve fundamental investments in our future - in our racecourses and the customer experience, in our web platform and in our training facilities. The training facilities are now more than 30 years old and need rehabilitation, a problem which is going to occupy us for some time. For example, to renew our all-weather track would mean closing it for at least two to three months and that isn't an option. We also have significant limitations with space but we are looking at solutions."

The master plan will involve significant spending but the timing could be right - with the tax guarantee over, along with the worst of a global financial crisis in which the club showed some real resilience to lose just 1 per cent of its business. One crucial area of investment will be the internet, with an eye to international commingling of pools and, for the club's sports betting arm, the 2010 World Cup and fresh competition from the imminent sports books in Macau casinos.

"For racing, the clearest relevance here is commingling, which has been tied up in double taxation problems," the Jockey Club chief said. "Commingling is not a matter of increasing gaming locally, but will increase revenue for Hong Kong and the club. Hong Kong will miss out on HK$150 million to HK$180 million in tax revenue if we don't resolve the double taxation issue, but I believe the finance ministry now understands the principles and we can solve this problem during the current season. Commingling could add HK$3 billion to HK$4 billion to our turnover."

Jockey Club chief executive Winfried Engelbrecht-Bresges is confident the government will this season give the green light to the commingling of betting pools - where other countries can place bets in Hong Kong's multimillion-dollar pools, reports the HK Racing Post.

Its report says: Engelbrecht-Bresges wants to get his hands on the estimated HK$3 billion sloshing around in other countries' betting pools - which would generate more than HK$150 million in tax revenue for the government. Having finally been given approval for five more race meetings each season - the first of 83 meetings starts next Sunday - Engelbrecht-Bresges said he would now up the ante for commingling to be introduced.

Australian racing fans, for instance, can watch and bet on Hong Kong's races every meeting, but their money is bet into a tiny Australian pool. Under a commingling agreement, Australian betting operators would send those bets through to the much larger and more attractive pools in Hong Kong. And so would South Africa, France and other jurisdictions around the globe. Or they would if there was not a problem with double taxation. Currently, the Jockey Club must pay full tax on its gross revenue for these overseas bets with nothing to offer the foreign operator for profit, so it is not viable.

"It is very complex and it has not been on the government's list of priorities, but I think that from our discussions lately, the principles are now being understood and I'm optimistic we could go for Legco's approval and reach a final implementation some time this season," Engelbrecht-Bresges said.

He said there was a lot happening in commingling in Australia, South Africa, France and the US, but that Hong Kong had been slow out of the gates because of the tax situation.

"If we can participate, I think the HK$3 billion now bet on our racing can become four, perhaps even five billion. Even at the lower rate of tax, that would be at least HK$150 million for the government ... I expect internet betting to continue to grow and the danger is that other countries will start to pool their Hong Kong bets with each other and make a very attractive business without us."

The wheel of fortune has turned again for Good Ba Ba and the champion miler will be reunited with jockey Olivier Doleuze for the coming season, says the HK Racing Post.

Its report adds: Doleuze was Good Ba Ba's partner during his clean sweep of the Group One miles in the 2007-08 season under trainer Andreas Schutz. The Frenchman won eight of his 13 rides on the gelding - four of them Group Ones - before he was unceremoniously dumped last year after Good Ba Ba opened the term with two defeats. Christophe Soumillon took over as Good Ba Ba won a second Cathay Pacific Hong Kong Mile and Stewards Cup before he, too, was beaten at the seven-year-old's final two starts last season. Owner John Yuen Se-kit has a long history of quirky changes with his horses and made the shock decision to move Good Ba Ba from Schutz to Derek Cruz this month, despite the horse having risen to the position of the world's top-rated miler under the German trainer.

The only reasons proffered for the move were "bad fung shui" and a wish to support Cruz as the trainer has been going through a quiet time. Now Doleuze's return as the gelding's partner, after a lunch meeting with the owner yesterday to discuss the situation, is almost as surprising.

"I was very upset when I lost the ride last year," Doleuze said. "I did nothing wrong and felt very let down after all the success we had enjoyed together and I know I said then that I would never ride for Mr Yuen again. But the past is past and I want to be professional about this," he said after Yuen assured him he would have the ride for the full season. "Good Ba Ba is one of the best horses I have ever ridden, a champion, and it is hard to say no to riding a horse who has been so good to me and has been such a great horse. He is the kind of horse you wait all your life to find. Of course, Good Ba Ba is getting older and Andreas did such a fine job with him that there will be a lot of pressure on Derek and myself to keep getting the same results. But I'm looking forward to riding Good Ba Ba again and I think he should have one more good season in him for Derek - he has been well handled so far and that will help."

www.racing.scmp.com

Having ground out a more-than-satisfactory result in 2008-09 against the dire background of the global economic crisis, the Jockey Club is already looking at some pivotal big-picture strategies for the new term, reports the Racing Post in Hong Kong.

It says: The coming season will represent the Jockey Club's 125th anniversary and chief executive Winfried Engelbrecht-Bresges intends to use the energy and goodwill created by the occasion as a springboard to bigger things in the immediate future. Engelbrecht-Bresges isn't one to let the grass grow under his feet. In fact, in an increasingly green world there could even be protests that he never gives the blades an even break at all.

Less than 24 hours after the Sha Tin finale on Wednesday, the captain and crew were locked in planning and strategy meetings at the Sports Road headquarters. "We are looking to the future and I'm particularly interested to discover ways to make the racing product more attractive," he said. "We have come off a successful season and we must now identify the major issues that will help us grow our business and build towards the future. One of the lessons of the past few years is that there are clearly differentiated customer segments and that we must be careful not to mix them. We want to develop a programme to attract and retain new customers, including those that are more leisure and fun oriented, with a lighter understanding of the racing product."

The new-term focus for Derby hero Collection has shifted sharply, with the intended mission of landing the Group One Cox Plate in Melbourne already scrapped in favour of the Cathay Pacific International races in December, reports Murray Bell in the Racing Post HK.

His report states: Trainer John Moore has made no secret of his career ambition to prepare a Group One winner on foreign soil (after three frustrating seconds) but has shelved the planned Cox Plate assault in favour of the Jockey Club's December showcase. However, international plans are merely on the backburner for last season's brilliant Mercedes-Benz Hong Kong Derby hero. "What I'd really love to do is to take him to Dubai in March for the Sheema Classic at the new Meydan course," Moore (pictured) said yesterday. "Of course, I recognise that he has to be invited first and I don't want to be counting my chickens before they hatch, but that's the plan.

"He seems to have come back very well and if he finds the form we know he's capable of, then he should be very competitive in our big races and hopefully that will be considered worthy of a Dubai invitation."

Moore said the initial plan to focus on the A$3.05 million (HK$19.44 million) Tatts Cox Plate at Moonee Valley on October 24 were canned, in consultation with Collection's owners, after an examination of the prevailing quarantine protocols.

"Unfortunately, you cannot race a horse in Australia out of quarantine, as you can do in Dubai and elsewhere," Moore explained. "It makes it quite a tricky exercise and then you have the next challenge of getting him back here in top form for December. On balance, we thought the better idea was to stay here and take aim at December, and see if we can earn an invite to Dubai. So in the end, we didn't even enter for Melbourne."

Collection will return to racing under handicap conditions in the Group Three Sha Tin Trophy over 1,600 metres on October 25, a race Moore won last term as the launching pad to Viva Pataca's Horse of the Year campaign.

Controversial owner John Yuen Se-kit has provided the first shock of the new racing season, admitting yesterday that his champion Good Ba Ba would be removed from the stables of trainer Andreas Schutz, reports Murray Bell in the HK Racing Post (www.racing.scmp.com).

His report adds: The new trainer selected by Yuen is Derek Cruz, who confirmed that Hong Kong's highest-rated horse of all time would join his string tomorrow.

"The owner rang me, out of the blue, and asked me to train Good Ba Ba this season," Cruz said. "It was a very big surprise, for sure, but I'm extremely happy to be given an opportunity to train a wonderful horse like this...Of course, it's unfortunate for the previous trainer but that's Hong Kong racing - we all get to experience both sides of it. Yuen could have chosen any trainer at Sha Tin and I'm grateful he's chosen me. An offer like this is not something you can say no to."

Schutz is on holiday in his native Germany and could not be contacted. His assistant trainer, Ricky Chung Chim-ki, knew nothing about the proposed move of the stable's flagship horse.

"The boss is away until the middle of August, I don't know anything about this," Chung said, though he later confirmed the story after telephoning Yuen. The sacking of Schutz is the second major personnel change in the space of eight months for Good Ba Ba, winner of six Group One races including the last two editions of the HK$16 million Cathay Pacific Hong Kong Mile.

From MURRAY BELL in HK Racing Post

Caspar Fownes describes himself as a competitive person by nature, but the energy and focus he put into landing his second trainers' premiership was real eye-of-the-tiger stuff. Traditionally, the trainer who heads into May on top of the trainers' table is crowned champion on the final day. Fownes tipped that tradition on its head this season, giving John Moore a 15-win start on May 6 and getting up to beat him by three.

At a time of the season when the handicap system starts to slow down the trainers at the top of the table, Fownes hit the turbo-charger for the final two months, preparing 25 winners across the last 14 meetings. When he won his first trainers' title from Paul O'Sullivan two years ago, the margin was nine wins and his 61 winners was a personal best. He has therefore added seven winners to his own PB (an improvement in performance of 11.5 per cent) and matched the figure John Size established in landing the 2008 premiership.

Although renowned for being the king of Happy Valley, a feature of Fownes' season was that he actually trained more winners at Sha Tin - 37, compared to 31 at the city course. The handicap system is often given as the reason for a "premiership hangover", making it hard for a trainer to win back-to-back titles because many horses in the yard have been moved higher up the ratings. But it hasn't seemed to slow Fownes down too much, as he followed up his first title with an honourable second to Size last term and now scores again.

Although he is a charismatic leader and undoubtedly the captain of his ship, Fownes generously deflects huge amounts of credit further down the line. He talks warmly about his assistant trainer, Chris So Wai-yin, and also of the loyalty of his staff, many of whom have been with him from the beginning and a number who go back to the days when Caspar's father, Lawrie, was the maestro.

By ALAN AITKEN in HK Racing Post

(www.racing.scmp.com)

Douglas Whyte continues to give us a problem - he is so efficient at winning the jockeys' championship, there is nothing left to write about him. Clearly Matthew Chadwick was the new story of the jockeys' ranks, but Whyte's ninth consecutive championship happened like clockwork - while elsewhere around town people were writing songs about him - and the finest testament to the Durban Demon is that nobody expects anything else. He is the dog-bites-man story.

Paradoxically, admirable consistency diverts proper recognition away from what a feat it is, to simply turn up and win the championship every year against an impressive array of opponents. He didn't make the century this time because of a late flurry of careless-riding bans and he didn't add anything to his pile of records except another swag of wins, but then Whyte already owns all the records.

The professionalism it takes to be so consistent for so long is easily overlooked, but we have no intention of overlooking it here and Brett Prebble, who has taken over from Shane Dye as Whyte's shadow, deserves a strong mention, too. Riding 80 winners or so for each of the past three seasons also takes some doing, despite getting beaten in the championship, and Prebble must be about ready to throw everything at another attempt to topple the throne.

Elsewhere, the roster is changing slowly - long-termers such as Eric Saint-Martin and Felix Coetzee have departed the scene and, while he returns for part of the next edition, Gerald Mosse's switch to training in France must be imminent.

South African Weichong Marwing provided one of the positive stories, resurrecting his season as a club rider after a woeful start with Ricky Yiu Poon-fai's stable, while Zac Purton built on a sound first season to position himself as a top-five rider next term.

Thanks to the champion Good Ba Ba, graduates of Hong Kong's international sale maintained a positive profile across the season, but the search for the next Good Ba Ba is proving to be both protracted and elusive, reports Murray Bell of the HK Racing Post.

He says: The star of the Andreas Schutz stable was the first horse to sweep the major mile races in 2007-08 and was on his way to something similar this term. But the good fortune that had blessed him for the previous 18 months went missing at the back end of the term, and a wet track for the Champions Mile meant the real Ba Ba didn't make it to Sha Tin.

Still, six Group One wins and the potential for more to come still makes Good Ba Ba a great running advertisement for the sale, which fell more in line with the rest of the world last December and sustained a substantial market correction.

The previous year's records for aggregate and average were trashed on the back of the global financial crisis, with both figures coming down 34 per cent. This edition of the sale grossed HK$87.2 million (from HK$132.4 million) and the average was down to HK$2.9 million (from HK$4.4 million).

The top-priced lot probably got there as much on "pedigree potential" as anything else. By top Australian commercial sire Redoute's Choice from a Bletchingly half-sister to champion stallion Zabeel, the HK$5.5 million colt went to Cheng Keung-fai, who two years earlier established a record price for Danesis.

Cheng's colt, now called Redoute Star and prepared by Tony Cruz, has been creating his own problems in races with slow getaways, though he did run third on debut behind Malayan Bright and subsequent winner Dashing Victory.

The sale graduates finished the season on a positive note, with Big Profit (trained by Danny Shum Chap-shing) earning the HK$1 million bonus for the most successful international sales griffin and Algarve winning for David Hall on the final day.

By MURRAY BELL in Hk Racing Post

Having ground out a more-than-satisfactory result in 2008-09 against the dire background of the global economic crisis, the Jockey Club is already looking at some pivotal big-picture strategies for the new term. The coming season will represent the Jockey Club's 125th anniversary and chief executive Winfried Engelbrecht-Bresges intends to use the energy and goodwill created by the occasion as a springboard to bigger things in the immediate future.

Engelbrecht-Bresges isn't one to let the grass grow under his feet. In fact, in an increasingly green world there could even be protests that he never gives the blades an even break at all. Less than 24 hours after the Sha Tin finale on Wednesday, the captain and crew were locked in planning and strategy meetings at the Sports Road headquarters. "We are looking to the future and I'm particularly interested to discover ways to make the racing product more attractive," he said. "We have come off a successful season and we must now identify the major issues that will help us grow our business and build towards the future.

"One of the lessons of the past few years is that there are clearly differentiated customer segments and that we must be careful not to mix them. We want to develop a programme to attract and retain new customers, including those that are more leisure and fun oriented, with a lighter understanding of the racing product."

The chief executive hopes next season may also see the arrival of commingling and typically takes the optimistic view that the Home Affairs Bureau and the Treasury will give the club a good hearing over something that is, after all, mere common sense. For those unfamiliar with the issue, some five years ago Engelbrecht-Bresges spun a breathtaking vision of a world where Hong Kong was the best racing-wagering product available and punters from all over the world were betting into our pools, ie commingling of monies from different countries, and the profits and taxes were shared between the host and the country of origin of the bet.

The rest of the world was captivated by the vision and ran with it, and many countries are now living the commingling dream. It is one of the cruel realities of the racing business today that Hong Kong is still unable to commingle because of the intransigence of our government and bureaucracy. Politicians and bureaucrats are still apparently unable to see that half the taxes on fresh, untapped, foreign investment into Hong Kong racing is infinitely better than 100 per cent of nothing, which is what their policy is generating at the moment.

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The Jockey Club will declare "weighed in" today on the two of hottest favourites in racing - that Kim Kelly will take over from the departing Jamie Stier as chief steward and Sydney-based steward Steve Railton will take up the vacant position on the panel for next season, reports the HK Racing Post.

It says: They are expected to be formally recorded today when the club holds its post-season media briefing.

Kelly, 41, began his career in Queensland under Ray Murrihy before moving to Sydney in late 1995 as a replacement for Stier when he moved to Hong Kong.

In Sydney, Kelly was again understudy to Murrihy and became his deputy chief prior to recruitment by the Jockey Club for the 2002-03 Hong Kong season.

After six years working under Stier, as well as holding the post of licensing committee secretary, Kelly's appointment has been considered a no-contest since Stier announced he would leave at the season's conclusion.

A straight talker who will vigorously defend an unpopular decision he believes to be right, Kelly has been groomed for the position virtually since his arrival and promises to prove a forceful hand in the chief's chair.

If the appointment of Kelly to the top job has been considered certain, expectation of the arrival of the highly regarded Railton, 52, has been almost as strong.

Kelly and Railton worked together in Queensland for many years before Kelly moved to Sydney and they have taken a similar path to get to Hong Kong.

After 28 years in Queensland racing, Railton lost his job as chief steward in 2003 when an administrative overhaul made the position redundant, but Murrihy snapped him up within weeks to join his team and Railton has most recently been his deputy chief.

As testament to the stewarding system in Australia, Kelly will be the third consecutive man in a row to arrive at the Hong Kong hot-seat through Sydney.

Railton will be the sixth successive new steward from there, following Stier, John Schreck, Martin Knibbs, Kelly and Philip Dingwall, though Dingwall arrived via a stint as chief stipe in Malaysia.

Today sees the conclusion of a remarkable season in Hong Kong for New Zealand thoroughbreds, having out-performed all other nations represented in terms of number of winners, strike rate of winners to runners and prizemoney won, reports Breednet.com.au.

It says: New Zealand-bred horses are also the highest represented of any country in the recently released Hong Kong Champion Awards nominees, with five individuals up for six different awards.

Nominated for two awards, the Champion Stayer and Champion Middle-Distance titles, is the Danny Shum-trained Thumbs Up (Shinko King x Regelle by Exploding Prospect). Footing it against Hong Kong's best, he's had eight starts in Hong Kong to win on two occasions and place on four.

Heading those nominated for the Most Improved Horse title is John Moore's 2006 South Island Sale graduate More Bountiful.

More Bountiful's rating increased 72 points to 124 since the start of the season including five wins in a row before going down by the smallest of margins to Thumbs Up in the Hong Kong Mile. He subsequently took out the HK-2 HKJC Chairman's Trophy and in doing so beat NZ-bred, Fellowship, and Viva Pataca.

Queensland Bloodstock agent John Foote secured More Bountiful for NZ$38,000 from Little Avondale Stud.

It will be the third year in a row a New Zealand horse has won the Most Improved title, with Sight Winner the victor last season and Armada (Towkay) the season before.

What a great way to end the Hong Kong racing season...Our tipster Sir Conduit gave 2 tips for Wednesday's final Sha Tin meeting and nailed ALGARVE $5.70! The HK season closes out now until early September. Sir Conduit will be back then with more super-specials for the Happy Valley and Sha Tin cards.

By MURRAY BELL in the HK Racing Post

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We hope the stipes were reading between the lines on Sunday when promising jockey Thomas Yeung Kai-tong threw a bright and potentially lucrative career on the scrapheap and declared his intention to get a business-management degree instead. Yeung said he had been considering this "for the past four months or so" and after taking into account the counsel of family members he had decided on the further-education option.

This column suggests it's no small coincidence that four months ago Yeung was suspended for nine meetings for failing to give Packing Winner every possible chance of winning or obtaining the best-possible placing at Sha Tin on February 8.

We spoke out strongly about what was an unfair, inappropriate decision. Yeung's guilty plea and failure to appeal merely reflected his intrinsically shy personality and the fact the imagined pain of the appeal process seemed as awful to him as the unjust medicine he had already been made to swallow.

In 2006, this column also disagreed with the stewards over their decision to ban Robbie Fradd on an identical charge for an honest mistake on Healthy Fruits. Call it coincidence, but Fradd didn't think twice when offered a job in Singapore later in the year and a former premiership-winning jockey was lost.

Craig Williams faced two such charges during his time here and another was avoided when he revealed he'd been concealing an injury, and he was penalised under a different rule. The first was simply wrong (Marshall Spirit), but on the third occasion the stewards were right.

However, Williams was then the recipient of behind-the-scenes pressure to leave, based on the three-strikes theory. Wouldn't the Jockey Club love to have Melbourne's three-time champion jockey back now? The intention of the "permissible measures" rule was to broaden the net sufficiently to capture dishonest players, making it unnecessary for stewards to prove motive. It was never intended to evolve into an over-the-top punishment for honest mistakes.

So over the summer break, if the Jockey Club can look back at the havoc that's been wrought with the careers of three good jockeys - not to mention the disincentive to others to come and risk their reputation - perhaps they'll realise this rule and its application is ready for review.

From Racing Post HK

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Reigning king John Size was left shaking his head after four seconds at a sodden Sha Tin yesterday and perhaps only a single win now stands between Caspar Fownes and his second trainers' championship on Wednesday as the curtain comes down on a thrilling finale to the title race. "I think I need one more to be safe," said Fownes after him, Size and long-time leader John Moore managed just one victory each, maintaining the status quo, with Fownes leading Moore by two wins and a further two to Size, with only Wednesday at Sha Tin remaining.

"John Moore is still a chance - he looks to have a good team in Wednesday but he needs a good day. "Johnny Size was the one I was worried about coming here today - he could have trained three or four and made it really interesting, but he's had seconds all afternoon.

"We've all been there and had days like that but he probably didn't want it right now. He also has a strong hand on Wednesday but he needs at least five winners now so it looks too hard," he added.

Fownes said he took a risk on backing up Victory Mascot - part of Brett Prebble's four-win haul - after the three-year-old had been unlucky last weekend.

"He should have won and deserved to win one so I'm pleased he's got there today, but he isn't the most robust of horses, only lightly framed, so he's done a good job to back up today," Fownes said.

Prebble said not to sell Victory Mascot short next season, despite him being in Class Five yesterday.

"He's actually quite a nice horse but has been a bit dumb and slow to learn. In Australia, he'd be the sort of horse you would train for 3,200m because he has tremendous lung capacity. He's only a three-year-old, had 133 pounds today backing up and he did a good job," Prebble said.

Moore trained his first winner since Viva Pataca took the Champions & Chater Cup on May 31 when King Of Hearts (Darren Beadman) broke through for his maiden win in the all-weather Class Four sprint and was left lamenting "just one more".

"I think if I'd had one more winner and gone into the last day one behind Caspar, it might have still been a race but it's hard now," said Moore, who has led the championship for most of the season.

"Anyway it was nice to win one with King Of Hearts because I'd already told the owner he was taking a long time to come to hand and acclimatise and might not get there this season. His last couple had been better and he'll pay his way next season."

Fast Winner has been a transformed horse since the addition of a one-eyed blinker and he should notch his third win in the opening leg of Sunday's Triple Trio at Sha Tin.
With the Jockey Club boosting the opening pool to HK$16 million, the main prize is expected to top HK$30 million, and Fast Winner is primed to get players off to a flying start with a return to his preferred course and distance.

Trainer John Size made the vital gear change at Fast Winner's fourth start for the stable and the results were instant, with the five-year-old dishing out a solid beating to his rivals to break his maiden status, reports John Bell of the Racing Post in Hong Kong.

His report adds: He was heavily backed at his next start on the all-weather track, but was right out of luck after knuckling out of the barriers and copping an early check, with his effort to be beaten only two lengths behind Newswire Too being outstanding.

He wasted little time in making amends, fronting up 15 days later and scoring a hollow victory, but had little luck last time over 1,000m after failing to overcome a wide barrier.

He looks perfectly placed with a return to the Sha Tin 1,200m circuit, should bounce straight to the lead under the guidance of Douglas Whyte, and looks an outstanding chance to run his rivals ragged.

His main danger, and an attractive double banker, is well-drawn Optic King, despite failing to notch a win in the past 14 months. The Peter Ng Bik-keun-trained gelding performed with merit behind Fast Winner after being posted off the track, before coming up short behind Not Quite Perfect after having every chance.

He should get the run of the race again and prove the toughest rival for Fast Winner, with other worthy inclusions being Kimberley, Newswire Too, Single Malt and Mr Floodlight.

Speed bomb Lucky Quality threw down the gauntlet to his rivals on Sunday with another dazzling all-weather trial performance last Tuesday. The brilliant son of Elusive Quality arrogantly won the opening heat by 15 3/4 lengths - the biggest winning margin at the trials for at least six years. Lucky Quality could boast both of the key quality indicators - margin and time. His winning time of 1:01.06 was the quickest he had clocked in any of his trial wins this season and it looks like there's plenty of gas still in the tank to end the term on a high.

Howard Cheng Yue-tin had the luxury of steering the four-year-old since flamboyant Frenchman Olivier Doleuze is sidelined with an ankle injury.

Lucky Quality gave his rivals - including last season's Hong Kong Derby winner Helene Mascot - a galloping lesson as he jumped straight to the front and ran his usual routine of "catch me if you can".

Lucky Quality is now a 111 rater, having earned a rapid elevation up the handicap after brilliant all-weather track wins (four), plus one at the opening meeting on September 15 on the turf. Since he's no longer eligible for any races on his preferred dirt surface, trainer Me Tsui Yu-sak has no option but to enter him in Sunday's Class One event against the likes of Willing Storm and company.

Since returning from his disappointing Group One Dubai Golden Shaheen assault at the end of March, Lucky Quality clashed with Hong Kong's best turf sprinters last month in a Group Three handicap at 1,200 metres. It was a run that can be overlooked as he never handled the rain-affected track.

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By ALAN AITKEN in Racing Post, HK

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Caspar Fownes forged clear of John Moore in the trainers' championship with a double at Happy Valley last night, but the title race may still go down to the final day at Sha Tin on Wednesday. Fownes and Moore began the night on equal terms with 62 wins but O'Reilly Magic (Zac Purton) and Whiplash (Matthew Chadwick) sent Fownes clear without reply from Moore, who had White Jade narrowly beaten in the final event.

"It's far from over, there's a lot of racing left still and I've got too much respect for John Moore and John Size to say it's finished," Fownes said. "John Size in particular worries me even though he's four behind because I think he still has a lot of bullets left to fire. I'm having fun, I'm in a great position but I've got my head on backwards watching for these other guys in the last two meetings."

Fownes gave particular thanks to rival trainer Tony Cruz, to whom Chadwick is allocated, after the win of Whiplash in the sixth race.

"Tony originally declared Matthew for the second emergency, Floral Picasso, but after I talked to him he let me put Matthew on Whiplash," Fownes explained. "The weight allowance and the great ride that he gave it made the difference between winning and losing and every win is so important right now."

Moore was narrowly denied in the final race, making his record nine minor placings from 30 runners since Viva Pataca was his last winner on May 31 and Fownes and Size have gobbled away the big lead he once held in the championship.

"Caspar has to be the favourite now, but I think it's great for racing to have the three top trainers perhaps going to a final day where anyone can win," Moore said. "I've got seven runners on the weekend and probably a similar number next Wednesday and I'll be taking a leaf out of Caspar's book and using some apprentice claims on some of them to try and offset where they've got to in the handicap," Moore said.

"What will be will be. We need good draws and some good rides but we're still in there and it's great for the sport. When John Size won his first title, he and Ivan Allan went down to the final meeting before it was decided and I think it would be great if we see something like that again."

From John Bell, HK Racing Post

Caspar Fownes' clever use of Matthew Chadwick's valuable claim looks set to again reap rewards when the pair team up with honest Whiplash in the final leg of Wednesday night's Triple Trio at Happy Valley. Fownes has only used Chadwick's services on nine occasions, but the results have been spectacular with the boom apprentice booting home three winners and a further four placegetters.

While it is over a year since Whiplash has troubled the judge, his recent efforts have been sound, and it's noticeable in his formline that this is the time of the year he shines. He performed with merit against quality opposition behind Sunrise three starts back, came up painfully short behind Toy Story after looking the winner on May 13, before finishing a close-up third to Fortune Haven when fronting up eight days later.

The form from that event has subsequently been strengthened with the runner-up, Viva Fighter, returning to his best at his next outing, and connections received an added bonus when Whiplash came up with the ideal draw of gate three. He should land in an ideal spot on the back of the speed and he won't get a better opportunity to notch his fifth success. His clear danger, and an attractivedouble banker, is the John Size-trained Lasker.

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HAPPY VALLEY on Wednesday night

Howard Cheng Yue-tin looks the spoiler to what oddsmakers labelled a two-man Jockey Challenge in opening prices. In another Whyte-Prebble free zone, with the top riders suspended, Weichong Marwing was posted a $2.80 favourite when prices went up for tonight's final Happy Valley Challenge of the season, with Sunday's Sha Tin victor, apprentice Matthew Chadwick, a tight second pick at $3.40.

While both have solid chances, the contest looks more open than that with a number of riders looking to have one or two plum rides mixed with hopefuls. A single upset result could swing the Challenge and punters might find better value away from the favourites.

Darren Beadman fans might fancy a piece of the $15.00 posted last night as he has two strong chances in Ever Beauty (race five) and White Jade (race eight), but with only five rides he will have to conjure something clever out of the remaining mounts to be the winner.

Cheng, though, has eight mounts, most of them with some claims to at least minor points and was listed at $7.50 in opening odds. His mounts include honest Kingston Winner, Steel Nerves and Royal Portrait, before coming home with winning chances - Speedy Star and Gilded Flight - at the back of the card. But perhaps his best chance will be Aipoder Image in the first - he came from last in a big effort for second last time and can round them up to break his maiden tonight, despite the outside draw.

ALAN AITKEN in the HK Racing Post