He’s on track for his most prolific month of the season but star local jockey Vincent Ho Chak-yiu will be hoping his April is just getting started.
With nine winners from six meetings so far this month – including doubles on the past two cards – Ho could hardly be in better form a week out from Champions Day.
Ho and his long-time partner in crime Golden Sixty will chase more history in next Sunday’s Group One Champions Mile, with the two-time Horse of the Year looking to become the first galloper to win the race three times in a row, while the jockey will also hunt further success in the Group One QE II Cup (2,000m).
After winning the 2021 QE II Cup aboard the brilliant Japanese mare Loves Only You, Ho teams up with another middle-distance star from the Land of the Rising Sun, last year’s Hong Kong Cup runner up Danon The Kid.
In the meantime, however, it’s a more personal milestone Ho looks poised to reach.
He sits on 65 winners through 63 meetings of the 2022-23 campaign, second only to runaway leader Zac Purton in the jockeys’ premiership and just two victories short of the personal-best win tally of 67 he posted in the 2019-20 season.
It looks a fait accompli Ho will pass the mark at some stage, and all being well he will push on well past 80 winners, but there’s no time like the present and there’s no doubt his preference would be to take care of business before his focus shifts to Champions Day.
Ho has nine opportunities to add to his tally at Sha Tin on Sunday, and he’ll be hoping he can strike with a pair of Caspar Fownes-trained gallopers.
Fownes’ Straight Arron steps back to the course and distance of his sole Hong Kong victory for the Class Two Wan Chai Gap Handicap (1,800m) after finishing fifth in the Derby and the four-year-old looks well placed carrying just 120 pounds in a race where he should be able to obtain cover behind midfield before running on strongly.
While Ho will be hoping he can take out the finale aboard Straight Arron, he’ll be chasing an immediate strike in the opener aboard stablemate Rocket Spade.
Unlike Straight Arron, Rocket Spade is still chasing a first Hong Kong victory, although he’s done everything but salute so far this season with three seconds, including one by a nose.
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The did all come at Happy Valley, however, and the five-year-old returns to Sha Tin for his second all-weather assignment – he was sixth in his first – in the Class Three D’Aguilar Peak Handicap (1,650m).
Rocket Spade is not the only in-form galloper Ho partners on the dirt, jumping aboard Frankie Lor Fu-chuen’s last-start winner Youthful Deal in the Class Three Kowloon Cricket Club Centenary Cup (1,200m) and Pierre Ng Pang-chi’s Billionaire Secret, who enters the Class Four Magazine Gap Handicap (1,650m) on the back of a runner-up finish last time out.
Rounding out Ho’s book are Innoconstruction, Copartner Era, Diamond Forever, Ready To Win and Podium.
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