Jockey Shane Dye took just 30 minutes to do yesterday what no other rider was able to do on the card at Sha Tin - win races from the front and the rear. Dye swooped on Almond Lee Yee-tat-trained Solar to take a thrilling finish to the eighth event then showed his versatility in the next race by landing Triumphant Unicorn a winner of the day's feature, the Midland Realty Cup, both on the track and in the stewards' room. With a tailwind in the straight and apparent bias to leaders on C course, backmarkers struggled to make a serious impact in nine of the 10 races but that must only add merit to Solar's brilliant sprint to grab Sharki right on the line. 'He's just flying since he joined Almond's stable,' said Dye, who had won in similar fashion on the six-year-old at his last run. 'Whatever it is, he has found the key to the horse. Triumphant Unicorn is an on-pace horse and it's clear they were favoured today so that made his job easier, but Solar didn't have that going for him.' Lee is making a great impression in his rookie season. Yesterday's victory took his tally to 17 for the term and it was his third win from four outings with Solar. 'I think Shane is the perfect rider for Solar,' said Lee. 'He used to ride Century Star, who was also a son of Exit To Nowhere, and he won seven or eight races on him in similar style so I think he has the right tactics for this breed.' While Solar has been a revelation under his care, Lee admitted that the gelding was not altogether an ideal subject for any trainer. 'Solar is a skinny horse, so you cannot train him as you would like,' he observed. 'And he is a windsucker - he has a lot of bad habits. Also, his style of racing means he has to be lucky. 'Today, when the first seven races were won by horses on the pace, I told the owner of Solar I could not be confident and he should prepare himself for defeat. I said we should not change the horse's running style as I didn't think Solar would be the same horse ridden closer. I told the owner he would have to have a lot of luck to come through the field and win but that's the way he has to be ridden.' Dye had no such concerns with Triumphant Unicorn for Danny Shum Chap-shing as that four-year-old is a regular on-pace runner, but his worries only began once the numbers were in the frame. Dye cleverly kept the gate closed on runner-up My Choice (Howard Cheng Yue-tin) past the 300 metres, and My Choice ran out of room to stake his claim. When My Choice did get clear, Triumphant Unicorn had the race in his keeping but after perusing the film of the finish, Cheng threw in an objection. 'I think if I get clear room, I would have won the race,' he said later but stewards disagreed and quickly dismissed the protest. They reported that Dye had acted correctly in holding his line on the outside of My Choice, with any contact occurring as a result of Cheng's shifting out after the 400m from behind a beaten runner. 'In some ways we were quite lucky because this horse was an emergency in the Chairman's Sprint last week and may have been forced to run against Silent Witness but fortunately he missed a run there,' Shum said. 'I am doubly happy because the third horse, Good Profit, has run so well at his first start for me when I thought he would probably need this race. He is headed to another 1,400m Class One on May 17 and he has more improvement in him for that.'
