Winning Singapore Weekend

It was another successful weekend for Te Akau Singapore trainer Mark Walker with winners on both Friday and Sunday.  The well respected colours of Raffles' Racing delivered the Friday victory when carried home by Sacred Sea while on Sunday, it was a dead-heat for Man Of Mystery, with judges unable to split the first two home ... the Singapore Turf Club reports ...

Sacred Sea's fighting win on Friday might have come in a modest Class 4 Non Premier race, but Ryan Curatolo's wide smile at the weigh-in spoke volumes about why it meant so much to the French jockey.

Curatolo was riding on a crest of a wave back in June-July, even figuring among one of the early live contenders for the title, but a series of careless riding suspensions clipped his wings. The win counter has just stalled since Grand Knight on July 27.

When Curatolo comes back in between time on the sidelines, he does try to snap the run of outs, but to no avail - until Sacred Sea ($56) finally popped up in a three-way go to scrape home by a nose from Sun General (Michael Rodd) with Billy Britain (Vlad Duric) third another head away in the $45,000 race over 1800m. 

The winning time was 1min 53.86secs for the 1800m on the Polytrack.

“It's great to be back in the winner's circle,” said Curatolo who now sits on 32 winners in seventh spot, 25 winners off Duric.

“A big thank you to Mark Walker, the owner (Raffles Racing Stable) and the Singapore Turf Club for the opportunity.  He seemed to like the whip in the left hand, the more I dug, the more he found for me. He didn't shy away.

“I've got three more rides tonight and five rides on Sunday. Let's hope for the best.”

Walker said the return to the all-weather did the trick for Sacred Sea, a Sea The Stars five-year-old who was shedding his maiden status in Singapore at his 12^th start.

“This horse has been unlucky here. I ran him on grass by default last time as the Polytrack race I had in mind for him did not have enough entries and was cancelled,” said the Kiwi handler.

“The run on grass was not that bad, but the return to Polytrack suited him better.

“Ryan was also hungry as he hasn't won for a while and he rode the horse very well. It's also great for races to have Dato Yap Kim San here, it's great to see his colours winning.”

and on Sunday it was the turn of Man Of Mystery, dead heating for first for Mark's partner and co-owner Mirka ...

Champion trainer Mark Walker heaved a sigh of relief when told he had “kept” his job after debutant and short-priced favourite Man Of Mystery just scraped home to share the spoils with Prince Alexander in Race 6 on Sunday.

The one-time Ararat (country Victoria in Australia) winner is the first - and only - horse owned (in partnership within the Black Widow Sanxing Stable) by the New Zealander's Czech girlfriend Mirka Vaicova.

“This is the first horse owned by my partner Mirka. First run, first win, it doesn't get any better, even if it's a half-win, we'll take it” said Walker.

Man Of Mystery (Vlad Duric, on the rails)

Revelling in that first unmatched experience of leading in a winner, Ms Vaicova could not resist a little dig at her new beau while sipping on the de rigueur celebratory champagne at the winner's hall.

“It's wonderful. It's my first horse and he won!” she said.

“It doesn't matter if it's a dead-heat. He's won and I will definitely keep Mark now!”

At the 100m, however, Walker was on the brink of “losing his job”, especially as Man Of Mystery was considered by many as a certainty on the back of his dominant barrier trial win at Kranji on September 18.

The $45,000 Class 4 Non Premier race over 1000m indeed looked all shot to pieces when the even-money favourite came off a smothered third spot behind race-leader Able Pins (Matthew Kellady) to hit the front at the 300m, looking full of running.

Man Of Mystery (Vlad Duric) with trainer Mark Walker on his right and Mirka Vaicova (to Walker's right)

But probably a little short on race-fitness, Man Of Mystery felt the staggers setting in close home. Three horses, Prince Alexander (Michael Rodd), Racer King (Koh Teck Huat) and Why Not (Iskandar Rosman) pounced in one fell swoop to finish together as one across the line.

With the naked eye on the slow-mo, Racer King and Why Not seemed to have just missed out for the top prize, but it was a lot harder to split the head-bob between Man Of Mystery and Prince Alexander ($35).

In the end, the judge could not separate them for the second dead-heat of the 2018 season (after Safeer and My Horse on March 2), with Racer King and Why Not in third and fourth place respectively, both a nose apart.

The winning time was one minute right on the dot for the Polytrack 1000m dash.

“He's going to be a nice horse here. He had only one soft trial,” said Walker.

“Vlad said that in hindsight, he took off too soon and the horse just got tired in the last bit. He will improve from that run.  He's taken a while to acclimatise. For now, I will keep him to 1000m and see how he develops further.”

Duric said as he had a lapful as they swung for the judge, he might as well let his mount stride along, but he had slightly overestimated him as they nearly got caught out.

“I hit the front too soon, but I thought I would win easy by a clear margin,” said the Australian jockey who had not scored since Destroyer Eclipse on September 21.

“I've had a lot of placings recently and it's been pretty frustrating. I'll take the half-win any time.”

The dead-heat certainly epitomised Duric's current riveting battle with Rodd at the top of the log. Boosted by his recent purple patch of form, Rodd has significantly cut back the margin on Duric in the jockeys' premiership, slashing it down from nine winners to one winner in a matter of two weeks.