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After Negative COVID Test, Soumillon Headed to Hong Kong For The Winter

Christophe Soumillon is to join the Hong Kong jockey colony for the winter after being granted a license for two months from mid-December.

Soumillon has not ridden since he was forced to stand down from commitments at the Breeders' Cup after failing a mandatory COVID-19 test.

As a result the Belgian, who was not showing any symptoms at the time of the test, had to spend the meeting in isolation while the two horses he was due to ride at Keeneland, Tarnawa and Order Of Australia, went on to capture the Breeders' Cup Turf and Mile respectively. Colin Keane rode Tarnawa and Pierre-Charles Boudot was on Order Of Australia.

The Hong Kong Jockey Club said Soumillon was due to arrive in Hong Kong on Thursday to begin quarantine and will be ready to ride from Dec. 13 – the date of the Longines Hong Kong International Races – until the license expires of Feb. 13.

A statement said: “Jockey Soumillon is scheduled to arrive in Hong Kong on 26th November and will undertake the mandatory 14 days quarantine period under the Compulsory Quarantine of Persons Arriving at Hong Kong from Foreign Places Regulation (Cap. 599E).

“Jockey Soumillon is presently in the UAE. Nasopharyngeal swab (NPS) for 2019 Novel Coronavirus (SARS CoV2) PCR Tests on 12th, 19th, 21st, 22nd, 23rd November have been negative.”

Soumillon has enjoyed previous successful stints in Hong Kong. In March this year he became the most successful jockey in French history when he won his 3,315th race at Compiegne, surpassing the total of wins established by Yves Saint-Martin.

This story originally appeared at Horse Racing Planet and has been reprinted here with permission.

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TVG Coverage Features Holiday Stakes, Opening Weekends At Fair Grounds, Tampa

TVG, America's horse racing network and leading ADW platform, will bring live horse racing into homes across the country on Thanksgiving Day with live racing from Del Mar in California and opening day from Fair Grounds in Louisiana. The award-winning network will also feature stakes races from Aqueduct, opening weekend from Tampa Bay Downs and premier international racing including the Japan Cup (Group 1) as part of the weekend coverage.

On Thursday, Del Mar will kick off a star-studded four days of racing featuring seven graded stakes races including the $300,000 Hollywood Derby (G1) on Saturday and the $300,000 Matriarch Stakes (G1) on Sunday. Todd Schrupp, Christina Blacker, Britney Eurton, Joaquin Jaime and Mike Joyce will be live on-site at Del Mar with exclusive interviews, expert analysis and selections while Simon Bray will be contributing to the broadcast from home.

The featured race on Thursday at Del Mar is the $100,000 Red Carpet Stakes (G3) which has attracted a competitive field of ten fillies and mares including representatives from top East Coast barns for trainers Chad Brown and Graham Motion. Orglandes, has been tabbed as the morning line favorite at odds of 5-2 for Chad Brown and the four-year-old filly will be making her stakes debut after an allowance win at Belmont Park in October. Irad Ortiz, Jr. will be in the irons.

The prestigious $300,000 Hollywood Derby (G1), the ninth and final race on Saturday, has drawn a field of thirteen of the top turf three-year-olds from coast to coast. The one-two finishers in the Hill Prince Stakes (G2) at Belmont Park in October, Get Smokin and Decorated Invader, have both shipped to California for a rematch. Get Smokin, trained by Tom Bush, will be ridden by Hall of Fame jockey Mike Smith and the Christophe Clement-trained Decorated Invader retains regular rider Joel Rosario.

The live racing season will begin at Fair Grounds on Thursday with a loaded ten-race card featuring the $125,000 Thanksgiving Classic Stakes. The six-furlong contest has drawn a field of eight including Manny Wah, the 3-1 morning line favorite for trainer Wayne Catalano. The four-year-old son of Will Take Charge was last seen finishing fifth in the Breeders' Cup Sprint (G1) and will be ridden by James Graham. The 76-day meet will run through March 28th and will broadcast in its entirety by TVG.

Racing from Aqueduct will resume on Friday with ten stakes races scheduled over the course of three days. Friday's featured race, the $100,000 Comely Stakes (G3) has a field of ten sophomore fillies set to compete in the 1 1/8 mile contest including Thankful, a daughter of Triple Crown winner American Pharoah. Trained by Todd Pletcher, the bay filly has won her last two starts and will be making her stakes debut under jockey Kendrick Carmouche.

On Saturday, fans of international racing can tune in to watch champion Almond Eye make the final start of her career in the Japan Cup (G1) where she will square off against undefeated 2019 Japanese Triple Crown winner Contrail and the undefeated Triple Tiara champion Daring Tact. International expert Candice Hare will host the broadcast and post time for the Japan Cup (G1) is at 1:40 a.m. ET/10:40 p.m. PT on Saturday night.

In addition to racing from Del Mar, Fair Grounds and Aqueduct TVG will also be featuring Laurel, Gulfstream Park West and more. Fans can tune in on TVG, TVG2 and the Watch TVG app which is available on Amazon Fire, Roku and connected Apple TV devices.

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Jockey Of The Week: Tyler Gaffalione Wins 15 Races At Churchill Downs

After leading the nation in wins and total purse money for the week, Tyler Gaffalione was named Jockey of the Week for Nov. 16 through Nov. 22. The award, which is voted on by a panel of racing experts, is for jockeys who are members of the Jockeys' Guild, the organization which represents more than 950 active riders in the United States as well as retired and permanently disabled jockeys.

Beginning the week at Churchill Downs on Wednesday, Tyler Gaffalione won three races, one each for trainers Mike Maker, Chad Brown and Eddie Kenneally. He picked up three more wins on Thursday with two for Mike Maker and one for David Vance. On Friday, Gaffalione continued his winning ways with four more wins, one each for trainers Bernie Flint, Mike Maker, Bret Calhoun and James DiVito. Saturday saw Gaffalione head to the winner's circle four times with two wins for Mike Maker and one each for Phil Sims and Mark Casse. In the final card of the week on Sunday, he posted one win for Chad Brown.

In addition to a 50 percent win rate for the week, Gaffalione hit the board with 76 percent of his mounts and $463,611 in total purses to lead all jockeys.

He out-polled fellow jockeys, Joe Bravo who had two stakes wins at Gulfstream Park West, Abel Cedillo who won the Cary Grant Stakes at Del Mar, Marcelino Pedroza with two stakes wins at Indiana Grand and Joel Rosario who won the New York Stallion Series Stakes at Aqueduct aboard Funny Guy.

Gaffalione has won 14 graded stakes so far this year including the Pegasus World Cup Turf Invitational aboard Zulu Alpha. He was the Eclipse Award winning Apprentice in 2015.

Leading the jockey standings at the Churchill Downs Fall Meet with 32 wins, seven ahead of Ricardo Santana, Jr., Tyler will head to Gulfstream Park after Churchill Downs closes on Sunday.

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Magical Looks To Exact Revenge at Longines HKIR

It has been 12 months since Ballydoyle’s Magic Wand (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) was just beaten to the wire by Japan’s Win Bright (Jpn) (Stay Gold {Jpn}) in the G1 Longines Hong Kong Cup, but that outfit’s globetrotting Magical (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) will try to turn the tables as the marquee name among 15 foreign raiders for the Longines Hong Kong International Races at Sha Tin Racecourse Sunday, Dec. 13.

No fewer than 17 international Group 1 winners are set to compete.

“The Longines Hong Kong International Races is firmly established among a select handful of the world’s greatest international racing occasions,” said Andrew Harding, Executive Director, Racing, for the Hong Kong Jockey Club. “To have entries of this calibre in any year would be notable but this year’s standard is remarkable given the challenge of the pandemic and all its attendant travel and quarantine issues.”

Magical, who took her career earnings to nearly US$6 million with her runner-up effort to Tarnawa (Ire) (Shamardal) in the GI Breeders’ Cup Turf Nov. 7, should be suited by the cutback to the 2000m for the Cup, a distance at which she defeated world’s top-rated runner Ghaiyyath (Ire) (Dubawi {Ire}) in September’s G1 Irish Champion S. and future G1 Cox Plate hero Sir Dragonet (Ire) (Camelot {GB}) for a title defence in the G1 Tattersalls Gold Cup this past July. A victory would make her the winningest Ballydoyle runner at Group 1 level with eight.

Ballydoyle has supplemented GI Breeders’ Cup Mile upsetter Order of Australia (GB) (Australia {GB}) to the G1 Longines Hong Kong Mile and he is joined by Lope Y Fernandez (Ire) (Lope de Vega {Ire}), who completed an Aidan O’Brien 1-2-3 sweep. G1 Grand Prix de Paris winner Mogul (GB) (Galileo {Ire}), fractionally disappointing when fifth in the Turf, looks to become a third winner of the G1 Longines Hong Kong Vase for O’Brien, while G1 Irish 1000 Guineas victress Peaceful (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) joins Magical in the Cup.

Up-and-coming French trainer Jerome Reynier has two runners engaged for the HKIR. The underrated Skalleti (Fr) (Kendargent {Fr}) has finished out of the top three just once in 16 career starts and exits a runner-up effort–with Magical third–to the soft-ground loving Addeybb (Ire) (Pivotal {GB}) in the G1 QIPCO British Champion S. Oct. 17. Royal Julius (GB) (Royal Applause {GB}) adds Hong Kong to his passport, having finished second in the HH The Emir’s Trophy in Qatar before winning the 2019 Bahrain International Trophy. He’ll take his shot in a compact field in the Vase.

Win Bright looks to run his record over the Sha Tin 2000 metres to three-from-three as he attempts to give Japan a fourth Cup in the last six runnings, and tries to join California Memory (Highest Honor {Fr}) as just the second horse to go back-to-back in the day’s richest event. Admire Mars (Jpn) (Daiwa Major {Jpn}), one of three Japanese-based winners last year, looms the chief threat to locally based Golden Sixty (Aus) (Medaglia d’Oro) in the Mile, and Danon Premium (Jpn) (Deep Impact {Jpn}), second to Almond Eye (Jpn) (Lord Kanaloa {Jpn}), and G1 Victoria Mile winner Normcore (Jpn) (Harbinger {GB}) line up in the Cup. Danon Smash (Jpn), a son of two-time G1 Longines Hong Kong Sprint winner Lord Kanaloa, and Godolphin’s Tower of London (Jpn) (Raven’s Pass) are entered for the 1200-meter dash.

Inferno (Aus) (Holy Roman Emperor {Ire}) represents Singapore and faces a big ask against the likes of Classique Legend (Aus) (Not A Single Doubt {Aus}) and Hot King Prawn (Aus) (Denman {Aus}) in the Sprint. He has conquered all before him at Kranji and has earned the right to compete at this level.

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