RACEDAY FOCUS: Fownes returns with strong hand as Yiu, Yip chase first wins

Caspar Fownes returns with another strong hand after dominating this meeting last season, while the slow starts of Ricky Yiu and Dennis Yip and Massive Sovereign’s rare Happy Valley appearance provide other angles to watch tonight. 

Familiar faces back in the frame

This meeting belonged to Caspar Fownes last season, when he won four of the eight races, while Danny Shum Chap-shing landed a double and Mark Newnham and Tony Cruz split the rest.

Most of the same names have started well again. Shum leads the way with four wins from 21 runners at 19 percent, Fownes is three from 17 at 17.6 percent and Newnham already has a double.

Cruz is the exception and remains winless after another blank at Sha Tin on Sunday, although his two strongest chances highlighted here both placed and the stable has done enough to suggest a breakthrough is not far away.

Fownes sends out seven today and again has plenty of chances across the card. Somelovefromabove drops in class and reunites with James Orman, the pair two from two together, while Love Together and Dancing Classics give him a strong hand in the Class 3 1,000m.

Another slow start for Yiu and Yip

Ricky Yiu Poon-fai and Dennis Yip Chor-hong find themselves in familiar territory after slow starts to the new season.

Yiu arrives tonight winless after 13 runners, although four have finished second. After this meeting last season he was also 0-for-14, having managed only one placing while two favorites had already been beaten.

Yip’s numbers look just as familiar. He heads into tonight 0-for-16, his best results a second and a fourth; after the corresponding meeting last season, he was 0-for-13.

Both get another chance to break the duck tonight. Yiu saddles four and Rosewood Fleetfoot looks the pick as he chases a hat-trick after ending last season with back-to-back wins over 2,200 meters.

Yip has only two runners, but Noisy Boy will be well found in the market. Zac Purton takes over in the Class 4 1,800m for only the second time, having ridden him to the first of his two Hong Kong wins in December 2024.

Derby winner takes the long road to the Valley

You have to go back a long way to find a Hong Kong Derby winner racing at Happy Valley.

Massive Sovereign becomes the first Derby winner since Super Satin in 2012 to race at the city circuit after winning the Derby, but his case is rarer still: he has never raced there before. Keen Winner, in October 2001, was the last Derby winner in the 2,000-meter era to make his Happy Valley debut after winning the Derby.

It has been a long road from Massive Sovereign’s 2024 Derby triumph to tonight’s Class 2 1,650-meter race.

He won the Derby for Dennis Yip Chor-hong, then moved to David Eustace for three starts before joining Frankie Lor Fu-chuen, who saddled him once last season for a 12th-place finish in a Class 1 mile.

The veterinary record in between makes sobering reading: surgery to his left-hind fetlock, later surgery to both front fetlocks and a right-hind tendon injury have repeatedly interrupted his campaigns.

Six Up Play

The Six Up ticket takes two strong stands through the middle legs: #3 Live Wire taken alone in Race 4 before we rely on #6 Young Arrow in Race 5. Young Arrow had little go his way late last season, but Zac Purton taking over could be the change that allows him to turn that solid form into a win.

Race 6 is where we spread widest, with #5 Highland Rahy, #1 Dazzling Fit and #4 Wrote A New Page all included, while three chances are also kept in Race 7.

There is added incentive with a HK$500,000 jackpot carried forward to the Six Win Bonus.

Race 3: #6 Rosewood Fleetfoot, #5 Romantic Laos, #1 Noisy Boy
Race 4: #3 Live Wire (banker)
Race 5: #6 Young Arrow
Race 6: #5 Highland Rahy, #1 Dazzling Fit, #4 Wrote A New Page
Race 7: #4 Dancing Classics, #5 Bunta Baby, #1 Love Together
Race 8: #8 Max Que, #1 Speed Dragon

54 combinations, HK$108 at 20 percent

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