09 Golden Jubilee Stakes

[jb]

Kingdom ready to take Ascot by storm: Yiu

Andrew Atherley in London
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Class, breeding and having the right name count for a lot at Royal Ascot, and today the regally named Sacred Kingdom will attempt to prove he is king of the sprinters when he lines up on the final day of Britain's most prestigious race meeting.
Hong Kong's speed star goes for victory in the 1,200-metre Golden Jubilee Stakes, bidding to cement his place at the top of the world rankings.

In a week that has seen winners from three continents, Sacred Kingdom is flying the flag for Asia in his attempt to become the first Hong Kong winner on the hallowed turf of Royal Ascot and only the eighth in an international Group One race.

Confidence is high in the Sacred Kingdom camp as he takes on sprinters from South Africa, Britain, Ireland and Greece.

"He's in top condition and I feel good about him," said trainer Ricky Yiu Poon-fai. "I'm pretty confident he'll run very well."

Sacred Kingdom won a thriller against Rocket Man in the KrisFlyer International Sprint in Singapore last month, and goes into the Golden Jubilee as the best horse in the field, according to international ratings.

"He broke the track record in Hong Kong, he broke the track record in Singapore, and the figures tell you he's the best," said jockey Brett Prebble, who has won two out of two on Sacred Kingdom this year.

"He is a serious sprinter and if he maintains his form from Singapore he will be very competitive."

The fast ground will suit Sacred Kingdom and, as an Australian-bred, he comes from the same production line as Scenic Blast, whose win in the King's Stand Stakes on Tuesday emphasised that Australia produces the fastest sprinters in the world.

Since 2003, Australian-breds have won five of the nine sprint races in which they have competed at Royal Ascot.

Sacred Kingdom is the only Australian-bred in today's line-up, but he must overcome the twin obstacles of a middle draw and the stiff Ascot straight, which will test his stamina as well as his speed. Yiu is confident in Sacred Kingdom's ability to adapt, saying: "The 1,200m course has its ups and downs and it's a lot more testing than Sha Tin or Singapore. It will be more like a 1,300-metre race, but I think he will be OK.

"He's a powerful horse and he finishes off his races well. Brett and I will have a good walk of the track on raceday but we are both pretty optimistic that he will cope with it fine."

Following the news that Takeover Target will miss the race, Yiu's stable star is one of only two horses in the 14-runner field to have won an international Group One, along with last year's Golden Jubilee winner, Kingsgate Native. And Sacred Kingdom's strong credentials finally hit home in the betting market as he joined J J The Jet Plane as 3.75 joint-favourite.

"J J The Jet Plane has to be given respect, but when I arrived here this week I was a little bit surprised Sacred Kingdom was not favourite," said Prebble. "He is the best sprinter in the world and in Singapore he beat the second-best sprinter - a horse who will probably end up being the best. That is serious form."

The race is at 10.45pm (Hong Kong time) and a delayed broadcast can be seen during the Racing To Win programme starting at 11.15pm on ATV World Channel, the Horse Racing Preview programme on ATV Home Channel, starting at 11.50pm, and Cable TV, Channel 18, at 11.15pm.

[jb]

On the global stage, Hong Kong has no finer representative than Prebble

ON THE RAILS, with Murray Bell
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Brett Prebble will again answer to the domestic dominance of Douglas Whyte in the jockeys' premiership, but at Royal Ascot on Saturday he has the opportunity to further expand his personal domain of superior performance.
Prebble has emerged as the leading jockey in the international arena and the recent KrisFlyer Sprint in Singapore on Sacred Kingdom gave him his third foreign Group One as a representative of Hong Kong.

Now we are admittedly talking about a limited sample here, with just six Group One races having fallen to Hong Kong-trained horses on foreign soil since Fairy King Prawn created the precedent in the 2000 Yasuda Kinen in Tokyo, ridden by Robbie Fradd.

But if Prebble and Sacred Kingdom can conquer the best from Europe and Australia on Saturday in the Golden Jubilee Stakes, that will give Prebble four of Hong Kong's eight foreign successes, and 50 per cent would be an amazing strike rate for something that most jockeys regard as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

Prebble came to Hong Kong originally for the final tranche of the 2002-03 season. He arrived with outstanding credentials, having been champion apprentice and twice Melbourne's champion jockey.

However, after he settled in at Sha Tin he also learned what so many other jockeys had experienced before him - it's a thankless task pushing around horses that no one else wants to ride at the back end of any season.

Prebble broke through at only his sixth ride on the Tony Cruz-trained Successful Spirit at Sha Tin on March 23, 2003. The gelding started at 26-1, making it the shortest priced horse he'd handled to that point. However, it was another 81 rides before his next winner, the David Oughton-trained Bravissimo (22-1) at Happy Valley on May 7 and things were far from rosy.

The turnaround rested on the ample shoulders of a noble grey called Precision, who should have been ridden by Whyte in the Group One Champions & Chater Cup (2,400m), but the Durban Demon was held to a prior engagement for Blue Stitch by trainer Tony Millard.

Almost by accident, at trackwork on the Tuesday before the Champions & Chater, Oughton's assistant trainer saw Prebble walking past and ushered him into the British trainer's presence, with the scripted request to ride Precision on the weekend.

Despite having won just two of his previous 121 rides, Prebble handled Precision with the confidence we now know to be his trademark and the grey defeated favourite Elegant Fashion, who had won the Derby the previous March. The HK$8 million race was, at the time, the biggest win of Prebble's career.

Not only was Precision the breakthrough Prebble required, he was the difference between staying on or going home with his tail between his legs. No Precision would have meant no invitation to return.

Fast forward to today and Prebble has ridden 342 winners, 73 of which have been this season. He's an amazing 35 wins clear of third-placed Olivier Doleuze and Darren Beadman and will be premiership runner-up to the dynamic Whyte for a fourth time.

The public loves him - he's well ahead once again in voting to be Most Popular Jockey, garnering 50 per cent of votes and that will be his second award in the past three seasons.

And he's on a winning roll, having won seven of the last 11 Jockey Challenges in which he's participated and has been favourite more often during that period than arch-rival Whyte.

These days Prebble's mounts often start at a shorter price than their form suggests and the translation of all that to Jockey Club powerbrokers is simply this - the 31-year-old is very good for business.

[jb]

Art attack sees off Sacred Kingdom

Andrew Atherley in London
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Sacred Kingdom was brought down to earth at Royal Ascot yesterday, fading in the closing stages to finish fifth in the Group One Golden Jubilee Stakes. Hopes had been high for Hong Kong's sprint star after his scintillating win in Singapore last month, but the writing was on the wall 200 metres out as the British-trained Art Connoisseur dashed home late for a surprise win.
The draw appeared to influence the result, with Art Connoisseur and runner-up Cannonball coming from barriers four and two respectively, but the biggest factor was the fast pace in the 1,200m race, with winning jockey Tom Queally saying "they went a hell of a gallop".

Sacred Kingdom was sent up to track the pace set by favourite J J The Jet Plane and Lesson In Humility and was in a good position to strike 400m from home, but jockey Brett Prebble was already getting busy and there was little left in the tank for the tough uphill finish.

With Sacred Kingdom fading into fifth, and Lesson In Humility and J J The Jet Plane hanging on for third and fourth respectively, the race was set up for late finishers Art Connoisseur and Cannonball, who had been at the back of the field going past halfway. Art Connoisseur got a great passage up the favoured stands rail and had first run on Cannonball, who made late ground under Olivier Peslier but was never going to catch the winner.

Art Connoisseur, trained by Michael Bell, was a surprise winner at 21-1 but he did have a Royal Ascot pedigree, having won the Coventry Stakes as a two-year-old last year and being rated a leading chance for the 2,000 Guineas before his season was cut short by a cracked cannon bone. He came back this year to finish seventh in a 1,400m Guineas trial and Bell then decided that sprinting would be his game, keeping him back for the Golden Jubilee.

The decision to supplement Sacred Kingdom for the race at a cost of HK$574,000 did not pay off, though time may tell that this year's Golden Jubilee was a good race, as Art Connoisseur is relatively unexposed after just seven starts and has the potential to take high rank among the European sprinters, while J J The Jet Plane is the best sprinter from South Africa and could improve in different circumstances.

Possibly it was too much for Sacred Kingdom to embark on another overseas trip following his victory in the Group One KrisFlyer International Sprint in Singapore five weeks ago. Two other minor factors in yesterday's race were that he was slow out of the gates and was involved in some scrimmaging after about 400m, but neither incident appeared to offer any excuse.

A sign that Sacred Kingdom did not reproduce his Singapore form was that Diabolical, beaten just over 3-1/2 lengths into third at Kranji, was just a short-head behind him in sixth place yesterday.

[Seabiscuit]

Sacred Kingdom is following in the footsteps of the Squib. Another HK pretender found out in the big time

[imaufo]

But both horses won International races. Whats wrong with that?