3 minute read
Sha Tin trainer Paul O'Sullivan is rebuilding his team after a year he would prefer to let slip into the past.
A stable virus caused havoc with his runners with a notable lack of success, and as is the way of Hong Kong racing, owners departed with their horses.
O'Sullivan was back almost starting again and he needed to have the stable perform this season to convince the Hong Kong Jockey Club that he should stay on.
Last week the stable achieved its 13th winner and then on Sunday it was win number 14 with Jade Pins taking a short head win in the HK$525,000 Class 5 Landshut Handicap (1800m) at Sha Tin.
“Got the pass mark which is not great, but it is certainly an achievement and physiologically it is very good. Hopefully we can build on that this season and end up with a pretty respectably tally,” said O'Sullivan last week.
“We had a virus go through the team last year, and I know a lot of people say they had a virus, but we dead set had one and it just wiped them out for the year virtually. So if you do not succeed here the numbers get depleted and it is a matter of rebuilding them up and buying the right horses.
“I have bought some nice horses for next season. It is one of those places where when things are going tough they are really tough and when things are going great it is the best place in the world.
“I have seen a lot of trainers here when their numbers get down very low and then all of a sudden a horse comes along and they are full and off they go, and I am sure that will happen to us,” he said.
O'Sullivan, 52, has seen it all before with this season being his eighth year training at Sha Tin. With years of buying horses under his belt he has been out restocking the stable.
“I think as far as value for money goes the cheapest horses are in New Zealand. Australia has got very expensive as their prize money is huge and horses from England have become very expensive. I have not had many of those, and I have not had much luck with the one's I have had,” he said.
“So I still keep my options open and will source from anywhere. The best horses are possibly the English horses, but they do find this environment tougher than what the Southern Hemisphere horses do, so it is a little bit each way."
O'Sullivan said that with the race fields fees settled in Australia, and prizemoney levels expected to increase over and above recently announced increases, that this will make it even more difficult to buy horses out of Australia.
“In my time here, and I think most of the trainers would say the same thing, there is a set price for a PP and a set price for a PPG, and they have not changed much here. But the horses have become forty per cent dearer. It can only really be if the stakes went up here that they could pay a bit more for the horses. It certainly has got harder to buy,” he said.
O'Sullivan said that he thought that the Hong Kong Jockey Club would be watching developments in the area of purchase prices and stakes.
“The guys who run this are the smartest blokes in the world and they are very mindful of keeping Hong Kong competitive internationally with international races and horses traveling around the world,” he said.
O'Sullivan said that it was easier for Hong Kong horses to travel within the region than make the trek to Australia for both spring or autumn racing and facing strict quarantine regulations.
He explained that racing in Australia's spring was difficult to fit into the Hong Kong season commencing racing in the middle of September out of a hot climate into the cooler conditions of the Australian spring. Also that with the ease of travel to and from Dubai, Singapore and Japan it made considering racing in Australia's autumn difficult.
“You have to have a very special horse to take Melbourne in the spring. The money is just as good closer to home in Dubai, Japan and Singapore and with basically a population of sprinter milers here with those races running for a similar amount of prizemoney they can run a little bit closer to home,” he said.
“It is a tough place Hong Kong, the worst horses are as bad as anywhere in the world and best horses are as good as anywhere in the world, and the horses that perform well, and are consistent, they just go up and up in grades. I have got three or four horses that are used to being in Class 1 but how much further they will go I am not sure, but I would not say I will have a horse that will run in the Group 1s next year,” he said.
The lack of stable stars apart, O'Sullivan's enthusiasm for training in Hong Kong has not diminished.
“It is a tough place when things are going bad, but you just have to keep your head up and keep going, and it will come right. The horses we have had this year have raced miles better than last year,” he said.
Jade Pins, by Pins out of the Danasinga mare Zephyr Song, just got home under apprentice KE Leung in the Landshut Handicap for his maiden win from 11 starts. The four-year-old gelding had been reshod to overcome flat feet and O'Sullivan put the new shoes down as the improvement factor for Jade Pins.
O'Sullivan was pleased with the win however on BMW Champions Mile Day, and it franked the return of the stable's form.