It looked gimmicky, even a bit silly at the time, but Zac Purton ringing the bell after his record-breaking 1,814th Hong Kong win on View Of The World on January 22 will be a lasting memory. The Jockey Club had set up a bell at both Sha Tin and Happy Valley so that Purton could ring it after every victory from January 1, when he was at 1800 wins, as a countdown to the record. Purton played into it and so too did the previous record-holder Douglas Whyte. The gimmicky became a fond image and very much part of the story as Purton rang in a momentous milestone in Hong Kong racing history. - Andrew Hawkins
There was only a hair's breadth in it. Romantic Warrior and Soul Rush were noses down together as they flashed past the Meydan winning post in the G1 Dubai Turf, but when the judge called the verdict, the Japanese horse took the spoils. That still image, the barely perceptible margin after 1800m of racing, left a sense that there was little justice in the result for a horse that had given so much in his three-race Middle-Eastern campaign.
Romantic Warrior's G1 Jebel Hatta win at Meydan in January was a bit of a 'gimme' and won as expected; then the dirt track thriller in Riyadh saw Forever Young rally late to pass Hong Kong's hero in one of the races of the century. The Dubai Turf was a chance to end on a high, but while the champ's reputation lost nothing in defeat, that photo finish image was the difference between unbridled elation and a flat feeling of 'if only.' - David Morgan
Zac Purton blowing a kiss to a camera on the inside of the track aboard Ka Ying Rising in November's Jockey Club Sprint perfectly illustrated the dominance of one superstar in the saddle and the emergence of another superstar in the world's sprinting ranks.
He wasn't even a Group 1 winner at the time, but Ka Ying Rising stamped himself as a potential great when he smashed Sacred Kingdom's Sha Tin 1200m track record that day as Purton uncharacteristically gave a cheeky salute to the Jockey Club's new camera. The ease with which Ka Ying Rising quickened clear from his rivals was captured beautifully by that shot and was rare a sight to behold. - Jack Dawling
It's certainly not an uplifting image, but the carnage following the second of two horrific falls on February 9 at Sha Tin sticks in the mind and it marked a turning point in the season.
That the brutal accidents happened at the 44th fixture of the 88-meeting season only added to their pivotal nature, not to mention fuel superstition among sections of the local media in the first two weeks of Lunar New Year.
The first fall ended Vincent Ho's season and set him on a painstaking path of rehabilitation, the second halted Zac Purton's march toward a potentially record-breaking campaign and saw him miss a Group 1 aboard Ka Ying Rising. Combined, the incidents resulted in a mid-season mini upheaval of the depleted jockey roster.
Ryan Moore, Tom Marquad and Hollie Doyle arrived on cameos to make up for the jockey shortage. James Orman and Richard Kingcote also took opportunities as pinch-hitters and will start next season on the full-time roster.
Three jockeys were hospitalized and a horse died. The widespread negative publicity in Hong Kong's non-racing media was a wake-up call. That 'news' coverage was a sign that times have changed, even in Hong Kong, and a sharper public relations response will be required from the club in the future. - Michael Cox
This story first appeared on Idol Horse.
