Retiring trainers Ivan Allan, Geoff Lane and Eddie Lo Kwok-chow had varying fortunes on their final day yesterday, with only Allan managing to present a winner in absentia as he bowed out. Allan, still in England after his triumph at Royal Ascot on Tuesday, won with Joyful Spirit after a perfect steering job from Anton Marcus in the third event. The win took Marcus to 55 wins and fifth place for the season - easily eclipsing his previous best - and Allan to 31 wins and a career total in Hong Kong of 544 wins. Lo had just the lone runner, with Great Sensation finishing eighth in the fourth race, while Lane heads to Macau to train from July 1 after being unable to complete the dream finish. Lane-trained Daneprint went closest of his four runners, looming as a threat in the opening race before having to settle for fifth. Trainer Ricky Yiu Poon-fie took a winner and some hefty kudos from the final day after winning with Flying Bishop (Torsten Mundry) in the Golden Years Handicap, 1,600m. Flying Bishop had won his first start of the term on September 6 and was still going strongly yesterday. 'He's held condition all year and he's so genuine,' Yiu said. 'The weight was a worry today - he's not a particularly big horse to be carrying 132 pounds - but he is always there somewhere and he's the kind of horse that, if anything goes wrong with the favourites, he can win.' Plenty went wrong with the favourites yesterday as public fancy Dave's Best lost Douglas Whyte at the start and Flying Bishop was as good as Yiu's word. 'When I spoke to Torsten before the race, I saw Flying Bishop was at long odds and just said to him 'don't understimate this horse',' Yiu beamed. South African champion last season Anthony Delpech ended a frustrating Hong Kong season yesterday winning the Class Four first event on Speed Of Light for Peter Ng Bik-kuen and promising to return with a different approach if he is relicensed in the future. 'It was tough but in the end I've finished quite well, and I've learned a lot. It wasn't easy but I've had it a bit easy at home in the last couple of years,' said Delpech, who rode well over 300 winners in South Africa last season to break the record but had to settle for just 20 in Hong Kong during the past nine months. 'I missed out on the start of next season but I'm applying for the second part and if I can get a licence, I'd come back with a different attitude. 'Suspensions cost me badly this season. I was out for 17 days altogether. Every time I'd come back and ride a couple of winners, I'd get time again, so I never got any momentum going.' South African David Ferraris rounded out his first Hong Kong season with his 25th winner yesterday as Majestic Feeling shared honours in the sixth but the apple of his eye was beaten runner, Vengeance Of Rain. 'He's a really lovely horse, great attitude. A lot of horses don't cope here but Vengeance Of Rain has thrived,' he said after the three-year-old was relegated to second by Perfect Partner in the ninth. 'Hopefully, he's going to become my Derby horse for next year. The international races are a possibility but we'll just see how his early season racing works out.' Majestic Feeling won his second from four in the 1,200m sixth, however, putting the lie to his failure as favourite last start. 'He has had trouble with the soles of his feet but he seems to be good right now,' Ferraris said.
