Birthday winner for Olivier Doleuze as Hong Kong-based owner Ben Keswick breaks his local duck
It was Olivier Doleuze's birthday and he celebrated by winning the opener on Richard Gibson-trained Fire Starter in some famous colours, but the French rider has had more birthdays than the four-year-old has had victories in the couple of years he has been here. Owner Ben Keswick is better known as the owner of former top class British filly Sky Lantern and it was a serious drop in grade to win a Class Five with Fire Starter but the gelding has always shown more than he has delivered. Significantly, he jumped on terms with the field, Doleuze had him in the box seat and that was the story of the race. "It's great to get Ben's first win here but it should have happened a long time ago - he has had to wait a lot longer than I expected," Gibson said. "But now that Fire Starter has matured and the penny has dropped with him, maybe he will put a few wins together." Alan Aitken
Peter Ho makes gear adjustments to win first-up with new arrival
Hoxo just loves getting sand kicked in his face and trainer Peter Ho Leung said that was a key to winning with him at his first outing for the stable. Hoxo (Howard Cheng Yue-tin) has had a long and infrequent racing career - a rising eight-year-old with just 15 starts prior to yesterday - and swamped his rivals to win right on the line in the Class Four dirt mile after Ho had removed all his headgear. "He used to race in pacifiers, but why would he need those? He is a veteran of the dirt track, and loves the kickback in his face," Ho said after the 40-1 win that surprised everyone, but his connections. "So I took off the pacifiers and I was very confident." Alan Aitken
Local rider forced to miss last two races after barrier mishap
Jacky Tong Chi-kit had an unfortunate meeting with a barrier stall that forced him to miss his final two mounts at Sha Tin, but he will be declared for rides at Happy Valley when acceptances are taken this morning. Tong struck his knee on the gates in race seven as Windicator Star made a pig's ear of the start, as he often does. The knee was painful enough for him to forego rides on Backbench Blues and Flying Tourbillon in the last two events, but neither threatened to make his day any worse by winning. Chief steward Kim Kelly said trainers would not be required to nominate standby riders for Tong when fields are issued for Wednesday. Alan Aitken
