We were wondering why the hell we were sent this very odd video- see below- featuring two old blokes until we realized- wait- it’s our mates trainers Paul O’Sullivan and Sean Woods. Now, both are lovely boys and are real triers in making a real Go with that they have in their stables- which is not much- and we salute them for their perseverance. But why they agreed to make right knobs of themselves by appearing in this silly piece of weirdness is beyond us.
Who on earth came up with this absolutely stoopid idea- and what for- and aimed at what viewers? Of course, “What viewers?” is something we often ask ourselves whist watching the three Captains plod through their tips on the Good Ship Lollipop aka The Starship Racing To Win wearing their barbershop quartet pink and white striped shirts, and blazers to hide this part of their Sam The Sham The Tailor sartorial elegance resembling shirts worn by several gentlemen from the Sub-Continent we have met down Nathan Road wanting to sell us precious stones.
There sit Captains Flindell, Hutchison and Davies looking decidedly forlorn on a set which resembles a Toys R Us psychedelic bumper car and the launching pad for Thunderbirds Are Go. And now to add to this mess, here we have Captains Woods and O’Sullivan filming a Morecambe and Wise-type of skit to promote this programme.
There are two problems to this: The programme/show is on life support and Morecambe and Wise were good with their skits as they were just so bad. This is simply stiff and bad. This is not Morecambe and Wise. This is Morecamp and Stoopid and Dumb and Dumber.
Now, what might have added some juice to this video would have been seeing our old mate Wally “I really am a big wally” Pyrah aka Max Headroom do his famous cardboard cut-out walk-on part as he usually does across the Happy Valley Beer Garden every Wednesday and which scares all the little girlies away by resembling Frankenstein. Yes, Wally/Max straightens his back, doesn’t move his head and takes giant manly strides through all he surveys. Funny how some in the UK and journos we know at Bloomberg tell us- and insist- that the Big Wally runs the HKJC. Oh puhleeze…
Wally Pyrah having a Happy Wednesday and on his way to the Racing Club.
Many times, Wally has nearly made a right wally of himself by walking over all the little people in his way. But, having said this, we like Wally Pyrah though, like the video above, we have no idea what he actually brings to the party other than some comedy relief.
THE MANY FACES OF WALLY PYRAH
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It had been a long weekend of racing after watching More Joyous win her 20th consecutive win as expected at Rosehill on Saturday and Tommy Berry take out the Kingston Stakes aboard Epaulette and with that, rack up his first Group 1 winner by beating Darley stablemate Albrecht.
It was a brilliant ride and we just wish the little Berry could be a bit more consistent as his ride on Strawberry Boy was not exactly peachy and what a gawdawful pun that was.
Elsewhere in Oz, Glen Boss answered the question, Who’s The Boss? by riding a treble- including a brilliant ride on Love For Ransom- and so nearly a quartet and, in so doing, made one Craig Williams look ordinary. Frankly, we don’t know what all the fawning for Williams is about as, at least to us, we reckon he is a very overrated jockey who needs a lesson in humility as he does go fucking on and on and on. Even when we thought The Bossman had shut him up, Williams still went on and on and on.
WHO DA BOSS?
And like many, we’ll be going on and on about another very overrated jockey in Joseph O’Brien whose riding “tactics” had much to do with Camelot not being the first horse since the great Nijinsky to win the British Triple Crown. Camelot might not be another Nijinsky, but that ride killed many stories that had already been written though our respect for the great horse remains intact.
This was in Saturday’s St Leger when the Boy O’Brien decided that the quickest way to win was to go through the backside of other horses. After that disgraceful ride, we had to listen to the Old Man O’Brien’s excuses- and which, not surprisingly, did not include a spray aimed at his son. He was lamenting “the steady pace” of the race- huh?- and how he “should have used pacemakers”. Huh?
DUH! DUH! DUH!
As for the winner of the race- Godolphin’ s Encke- it was ridden by French whiz kid Mikhael Barzalona, who, as if on cue, became so exuberant after the win, he nearly fell off his horse. Again.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTd5HH1yoFc
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And so we headed to Shatin’s Stylish Sunday meeting wondering what to expect on what was a pretty lackluster card dented and bent and made black and blue even more with a couple of all-weather races which always give us the willies. Then again, lackluster cards or not, Hong Kong racegoers simply don’t care. As long there are some races, they’re there in their thousands and which is why even compared to last season’s brilliant results, turnover and attendance for the first two meetings for this season have been higher.
This is also why a number of corporates, tired of nickel and dime punters in Oz who have heart palpitations if they bet AUD$ 1,000, are sniffing out Hong Kong and Singaporean punters to be their customers. We see some huge problems, not the least of which is that it’s illegal for both sides to accept bets from Hong Kong and even if this rule is like saying, jockeys cannot bet. many online betting shops will crash under the weight of many bets as they can start at AUD$50,000 and trying to “spread this wealth” across a number of totes will always end up in tears.
Another thing: Many of the sites are simply not good enough and unless people travel and leave their safety zones, they have no idea how damn parochial and petty-minded they have become along with underestimating many and living in a blinkered La La world.
As for the racing in Hong Kong and at Shatin, perhaps today, many were showing to see if Champion Jockey Douglas Whyte manages to get a winner on board, and if he doesn’t, they’ll be there to howl at the moon and give him a gawdawful spray and one of those long extended boos which, in Cantonese, is a very guttural sounding word called “Diiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiuuuuuuuuuuuu”.
“Get a hold of yourself, man! Repeat after me, “I AM THE MAN!” I AM THE MAN!”
Yes, if one were to look at the jockeys ladder right now, it looks very strange to see Alex Lai, Howard Cheng, Eddie Lai and Keith Yeung ahead of the Whyte Man and Zac Purton being the leader of the pack on five winners and with Little Timmy Clarke aka “The Hobbit” and new boy Richard Fourie on two winners, each having ridden a winner on both race meetings to date.
LITTLE TIMMY CLARK
On our way to our table at Shatin, we happened to meet Bill Nader, the Director of Racing, in the elevator. Mr. Bill was huffing, puffing and sweating profusely which we can only put down to ringing that ding-song, who’s there? CSL bell on Wednesday night to mark the launch of another boring 1010 Million Challenge which few know or care about and chase the 1010 cheer leaders the company had hired to pom pom their marketing efforts. Hmmmm, why does this idea sound so daftly familiar? Well, this whole Millions Challenge is daft, but, hey , it’s not our money. It’s like 1010’s equally daft ad campaign with a theme liberally “borrowed” from Nike and bent into something uncool and nonsensical. 1010? It’s more like a big fat Zero.
“I’m soooo happy, I can burst! Is my fly undone?”
As Mr. Bill spoke and we like the big guy enormously- we started to feel a little giddy as he tended to suck in all the air around him. He’s a big man who seems bigger after his Summer break and when, we hear, was on a steady diet of cheeseburgers and American-sized jumbo hot dogs. We stumbled outta the elevator and were happy to finally inhale some air as Mr. Bill bounded towards the buffet table in search for some turkey legs. We watched him attack the table and Mr. Cresoto, below, sprang to mind.
The day got off to a good start for Tye Angland who was at his mount Happy Ceramibo- what’s a ceramibo?- from the start and which led from barrier to post. If there were any “personal problems” plaguing the rider on Wednesday when he pulled the pin on the meeting, it sure didn’t show as gave this newcomer to the Danny Shum stable a very aggressive ride.
A HAPPY TYE ANGLAND
Just to show that some things never change, Weichong Marwing had his horse three wide as he headed towards the nearest McDonald’s. Someone, get the man a compass!
Marwing must have got stuck between the Golden Arches or the Golden Arses as we didn’t see him on the red hot favourite Champagne Days in Race 2.
“Five Big Macs to go, mate.”
Instead, right after the Racing To Win team were pontificating about Douglas Whyte’s slow start to the season and the new rules about how many rides one can take on for a trainer etc, the jockey rode a very smart tactical race which the others handed to him on a silver plate by letting him lead, stack them up- except for Marwing- and then push the Go button and- bang- the Whyte man was off the mark.
“Yeah, yeah, enough applause. I haven’t finished yet.”
Also off the mark for the season was trainer Caspar Fownes when the Zac Attack guided Grand Elite past the post. This horse will be one to keep following, especially, when promoted and running at a lower weight and over longer than 1400m. Zac Purton was hard at work on the horse to get it alongside leader Mazusake, but once there, it then sprinted away for an easy enough win and which also showed there’s plenty more upside left. Apart from Grand Elite, the horse to follow from this race is Travel Brand which made a move from last, got into a bumping and grinding match and flew to finish just behind the placegetters.
“Yeah, baby, that’s a nice pair of steins. Wunderbar! Now put them away!”
The Woodpecker Handicap was taken out by Full Value at 14-1, tipped by Jenny “From The Paddock” Chapman and featuring the combination of “The Hobbit” and trainer Richard “Dick” Gibson, the latter’s fourth winner for the season- JoJo MmmmmmcKinnon’s good fung shui must be rubbing off on him- and Little Timmy Clark’s third winner for the season. Among those in the winning photo was the noted cocksman Gerard Mmmmmmosse.
“They say he’s quite the swordsman.Mmmmmm.” “Yes, Tim Clarke looks like he would be a pocket rocket. Mmmmm.”
This was also the first leg of the HK$57 MILLION Triple Trio and tipped by those candy-striped Captains from the Starship Racing To Win who sighed an audible sigh of relief and self-satisfaction and now waited to see what would unfold in the second leg as they burst into humming the Thunderbirds Are Go theme song.
The Thunderbird Captains’ Triple Trio was still intact after Race 5 when their double bankers came in first and third and one of their legs running into second place. The winner was Double Dragon and it was great to see Vincent CY Ho ride his comeback winner after his very heavy fall last season. It was good to hear the Captain’s rather quiet and possibly- and quite rightly so- gobsmacked. It was now all or nothing and with a chance of getting a part of the $57 MILLION Triple Trio Jackpot.
“What? Jenny is tipping Honey Fortune??? What about OUR horses? What about our BANKER- the ONE???
Alas, What a heart ridden by Alex Lai won race 6 with a leg in the air and broke the hearts of our Capitans who had bankered on Expedite to run in the top three. It didn’t. The win gave Lai his 200th career win whereas all the money dumped on the Sean Woods’-trained Brothers In Arms and ridden by Little Timmy Clark went down the crapper.
As the day progressed, things took on a familiar turn: Douglas Whyte and Johnny Size combined to have three winners apiece.
John Moore had another Cup winner- and it wasn’t ridden by Brett Prebble. This was when Derek Leung aboard Sunny Fay took out the Chinese Recreation Club Cup and by so doing, deflated the egos of all the new and old “rising stars” of turf while taking out Race 9.
And if you heard a mighty clap of thunder, well, that was our old mate David Ferraris aka Darth Vader clapping his hands and doing a little dance and getting down tonight as his Chater Way romped home under its light weight and gave new boy Ritchie Fourie another winner making it a winner each day of the season.
“Do you have any fucking idea what that win means to me, you very little man?”
David Ferraris makes his feelings known to Ritchie Fourie.
What was most telling was this: Despite copping a 2-days suspension for his ride in Race 1, Whyte lightning was back with a vengeance and his ride and win on Mentor in the last was determination personified. This was Douglas Whyte giving the two finger salute to the knockers and the naysayers and saying, Okay now, shut the fuck up. It’s business as usual, babycakes. Deal with it!
“Do you have any fucking idea what that win means to me, you very little man?”
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MOST SCARY RACING PHOTOGRAPH WE HAVE SEEN!
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