Andrea Atzeni clinched a personal-best season haul in Hong Kong when he fired in a double at Sha Tin on Saturday, highlighted by Colourful King’s powerful victory in the Class One Pearce Memorial Challenge Cup (1,000m).
Atzeni reached 60 wins for the campaign, surpassing his best tally of 58 from last term, and strengthened his bid for second place in the jockeys’ championship when he guided the John Size-trained Master Lucky and Colourful King to victory.
With five meetings left this season, the Sardinian jockey holds a one-win lead over Hugh Bowman for second, with Zac Purton heading the standings with an unbeatable 134 wins.
“Reaching 60 wins was a target; I thought it was a nice number and we got there today and we’ve got a few meetings left, so I can’t complain,” Atzeni said.
Master Lucky produced a tough on-speed performance to claim the Class Four Sha Tau Kok River Handicap (1,400m) before Colourful King struck in the following race.
After settling midfield, the David Eustace-trained sprinter launched a strong run to hit the front 100m out and went on to beat Magic Control by three-quarters of a length, with Bottomuptogether holding on for third.
“It was brilliant to get back on him, I rode him in his earlier days and I sort of missed him early on in the season. He did it quite well tonight,” Atzeni said.
Colourful King relished a return to the 1,000m straight at Sha Tin, where he notched his only other triumph this season and a close second to Stellar Express in the Group Three Bauhinia Sprint Trophy.
“There was a little bit of me that was going to put him away after his last run, but obviously this race was too hard to pass up, so he freshened up well in Conghua and hasn’t done a lot since he ran at Happy Valley,” Eustace said.
“We’ve had just a frustrating run of near misses and disappointments, I suppose at the Valley, but he’s just clearly a better horse here down the straight. But there hasn’t been any races for him for a while. This race obviously was perfect and he had slightly less weight – he wasn’t having to shoulder top weight which counts for a lot as well.”
Eustace and Colourful King’s owners have raised the possibility of setting the Australian import for Royal Ascot features in the future.
“It’s been spoken about when he won for Zac [Purton] and then was second in the Group Three, Zac said ‘that’s the race that Little Bridge won and then they went to Ascot’, so it’s certainly a possibility, but it’s a long way to go,” Eustace added.
Karis Teetan took home riding honours on Saturday with a treble, booting home the David Hayes-trained Ka Ying Resilience before teaming up with trainer Brett Crawford to win on the exciting three-year-old Mr Incredible and Sovereign Fund.
Mr Incredible improved his imposing record to three wins from four starts with a commanding triumph as the favourite in the Class Three Shek Sheung River Handicap (1,200m).
“He’s a lovely horse, we always thought he was a nice horse and every time he’s gone to the races, he’s shown it and today was a big task,” Teetan said.
Crawford said Mr Incredible will be aimed at next season’s four-year-old series.
“There’s not many three-year-olds that win in Class Three like that, so he’s an exciting horse for next season and hopefully he’ll go further, which he definitely looks like he can,” Crawford said.
It was a night of opposites for Crawford’s winners in terms of prices, with Sovereign Fund’s win coming at an enormous $51.85, to counter Mr Incredible’s minuscule $1.25 starting price.
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