JAPAN DOMINATES THE 2019 LONGINES HKIR

By Darren Winningham | Sunday, December 8, 2019

AFTER drawing a blank at the LONGINES Hong Kong International Races 12 months ago, the Japanese were back with a bang at Sha Tin on Sunday, winning three of the four Group One prizes.

Win Bright, trained by Yoshihiro Hatakeyama and ridden by Masami Matsuoka, landed the richest race of the meeting, the Longines Hong Kong Cup.

In a tight finish, the five-year-old held off the late challenge of Aidan O’Brien’s Magic Wand who suffered an interrupted passage under Ryan Moore.

But it was the Japanese who were left celebrating a third win in the Cup in the past five years – and that was without their main contender Almond Eye who was originally due to run in the race.

It capped a remarkable day for the nation after Yasuo Tomomichi’s Admire Mars won the preceding Hong Kong Mile with Christophe Soumillon in the saddle. It was an impressive performance by the winner who was the first three-year-old to claim the prize since 2003.

The Hong Kong Vase was the race which featured the most British and Irish-trained runners but they all did not fire, with another Japanese horse, the aptly named Glory Vase for Tomohito Ozeki and Joao Moreira taking the honours.

Known affectionally as ‘The Magic Man’ by his army of loyal followers in Hong Kong, Moreira had an incredible day, winning two of the four Group One contested – his first win on this day since 2016.

He went into the big ones in a confident mood following two wins in the opening three races, and things got even better when John Size’s Beat The Clock took out the Hog Kong Sprint forty minutes after Glory Vase’s victory.

Moreira has had many magic days at Sha Tin, notably when winning eight of the 11 races in one meeting in March 2017, but a five-timer on Hong Kong International Races day is about as good as it gets.

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