King Of Glamour’s win in the Class 4 & 5 Handicap over 1050 metres (sand) on Friday night has seen trainer Stanley Chin edge to a one win lead in the race for Premiership honors.

With stable apprentice Eric Cheung doing a superb job from the outside gate of 11 to put the three year into the box seat on the back of the leading trio, King Of Glamour darted through on the inside late to finish too well for Win Win Hooray (Peter Ho), with Oriental Reign (Fausto Henrique) in third.

The victory was Chin’s 29th for the season and gave him a slender lead over Sio Cheong on 28, with Alan Tam and Tony Fung together in third post on 27 wins each. Both Danny Wong and the combined stable of Tommy Tse and Louis Ho hold down equal fourth spot on 24 wins, highlighting the closeness of this season’s contest.

Chin a former Champion Hong Kong apprentice that has ridden with success all around the world is in his fourth year as a trainer after hanging up his saddle back in 2014. After a moderate start in his first season with 11 wins, Chin has slowly climbed the ladder with his best season being in 2018 when fourth to K H Leong with 25 victories, and again achieving that score last season to be in fifth spot behind Tony Fung.

In terms of horse numbers Sio Cheong has 34 horses under his care with Danny Wong next best on 33 and Chin in third spot on with a yard of 31. In firepower Chin might have a slight edge on the other five stables with some nice newcomers and a few still well graded horses. Then we look at last year’s Champion Tony Fung who only has 26 horses in work, but quality wise they are strong and he will be a real force to be reckoned with right up until the end.

Sio Cheong who was Champion trainer in his first year in the 2016 season has had the most runners of any yard with 293 starters so far, but doesn’t appear to have the ammunition to keep on strongly until the end of the season with still 24 racedays left on the calendar. His older horses are marked up to their best and his youngsters are looking better propositions for next season.

Alan Tam has 29 in work and there still looks like a lot of winners to come out of the yard in the coming months. Danny Wong has plenty of horses to work with in his team of 33 and will finish the season off strongly, with the surprise contender being the joint stable of Tommy Tse and Louis Ho who while only having 22 horses in training and only 149 runners to date, have achieved the best strike rate of all with a 16% win hit and a 39% place rate.

Tony Fung’s Kelowna Star surprised many with a strong win in Friday night’s Class 1 & 2 sprint over 1200 metres (turf) upsetting the more noted speedsters in not only a superb win, but posting a time of 1.08.1 that many would have thought way out of his range.

Given a lovely ride by Brazilian jockey Fausto Henrique, Kelowna Star who is recognized as a far superior horse from 1500 metres and beyond was able to take up a position a lot closer in the run than most people had expected. Once in the home straight Henrique got off the back of the leader Winter Snow and sent the son of Sufficient (NZ) to the line for a good win at odds of $127.00 for the win.

Upset of the night was the Rambo Tse prepared The Moon’s Back who came from a long last under C F (Charlie) Chan to win the Class 2 & 3 over 1050 metres to blow punters out of the water.

Jumping at odds of $766.50 for the win, The Moon’s Back was having only his second run on the all weather, having previously battled to run fifth over 1510 metres beaten three and a quarter lengths back in December.

The Moon’s Back has the perfect pedigree for sand racing being by Hussonet (USA) from the Summer Squall (USA) mare Kuri Bay; however the six year gelding barrier trials on the all weather have never set the world on fire, and as well the 1050 metres of Friday’s race is a distance that most judges thought would be far short of his best given his best performances have been from 1500 metres and upwards on the turf.

The victory gave Charlie Chan his fist win back after being sidelined with injury since the beginning of this season.