Bend decision puts local horses at a disadvantage
A strange week with the Jockey Club's racing department and course management team pursuing two seemingly diametrically opposed policies.
The good thing for owners with horses with International dates coming up is that, thanks to the persuasive powers of Patrick Biancone, all is likely to end well.
But as things currently stand, on the one hand the Queen Elizabeth II Cup has been reduced in distance from 2,200 metres to 2,000 metres with the explanation being that this will give the local entrants more of a chance.
And on the other, the meeting on November 16 has been switched from the Old Bend to the New Bend at Sha Tin to preserve the ground.
Yet according to Biancone, this bend change will severely reduce the chance of December's showpiece International trophies staying in the territory.
Biancone's reasoning is that by changing from the Old Bend to the New Bend for the meeting on November 16, the distance of one of the main trial races for the Group Two International Cup will have to be changed from 1,800 metres to 1,900 metres.
On the face of it that is just a minor change, but it is not quite so straightforward as that as it will also mean racing around two bends rather than one.
'I'm not asking for any advantages over the runners from abroad but at least we should not be placed at a disadvantage,' said Biancone.
'If the International Cup is over one bend then the trial races should be as well.' Biancone has put these arguments to clerk of the course John Ridley and director of racing Philip Johnston, who have the power to switch the November 16 meeting back to the Old Bend.
Both have expressed their sympathy to Biancone's views and there appears to be every chance of a rethink.
The sooner it is announced the better, because preparing a locally-trained runner to take on the might of world racing is hard enough without unwarranted obstacles being put in the way.
The decision to reduce the distance of the Queen Elizabeth II Cup is to be welcomed as the millions of dollars on offer in prize money are in danger of becoming little more than a Godolphin bonanza.
The prize probably will still find its way to the desert kingdom but at least our runners should be more competitive at the 2,000-metre trip.
David Hayes put it succinctly when he said the current dispute over the apprentices Martin C.K. Tsang and Andy Ko is little more than a mountain out of a molehill.
The trainers will meet to discuss this issue on Wednesday and it would be a very serious one - top handlers pinching promising apprentices off already struggling trainers - if indeed it were happening.
The evidence indicates that the original fears concerning the roles of Hayes and Ivan Allan were unfounded.
Most revealing were Hayes remarks that both Tsang and Ko had approached him to see if they could leave their current trainers, Chris Cheung and Wylie Wong, and ride for him.
The importance of this remark is that it independently backs up Allan's claims that he didn't make any approach to Tsang.
So it really does seem that it is the apprentices who have been looking around to better themselves and it does not seem to be a case of greedy top-flight trainers going around trying to poach the best young claimers.
There would also seem to be a point of principle here.
Perhaps the policy line should be to do is what is best for the apprentices so that they can obtain the best opportunities to come through and prove themselves.
If this principle is adhered to then racing as a whole will prosper as the local apprentices are, to a very large degree, the sport's future.
But Cheung and Wong's interests must also be considered and from this Thursday, Cheung will have no retained rider nor an apprentice.
