HONG KONG students are being targeted for a specialist racing programme in the United States, writes Lawrence Wadey.

The programme is the brainchild of Dr Thomas Liang who has California Prince and California Hero in training with Brian Kan Ping-chee and Patrick Biancone.

It is being supervised out of the Universities of Louisville and Kentucky and Dr Liang said: ''This year we will take in 10 students from all over the world though we want to target those who will work for the Asian countries.'' Dr Liang added that the programme will hopefully cater for the development of horse racing in such potentially enormous growth regions as mainland China and Thailand.