Doraemon was a living proof of the adage “patience is a virtue” when he bounced back to the winner’s circle on Friday night, more than four years after his last victory.
Previously prepared by trainer Desmond Koh, Doraemon was then one of the up-and-coming four-year-olds, having even run in the Group 1 Patron’s Bowl (1600m) in which he, however, ran last. Two races later, he redeemed himself with a slashing win for Ronnie Stewart in a Kranji Stakes C race over 1200m on September 3, 2010.
42 races have gone by since, without success for the son of Bletchley Park, including a move to trainer Leslie Khoo in 2013 in a bid to spark him up again, but which reaped the same lacklustre results.
Plagued by bad legs, Doraemon was also getting long in the tooth. But the Arowana Stable did not lose faith in one of their pet horses, giving Khoo the freedom to patch him up as best he could.
A second place to Astrostar at the end of last year revived their hopes, but the same leg issue reared its ugly head again and another long time on the sidelines beckoned. Khoo and the Arowana Stable, again, kept the faith and Doraemon made his racing comeback in September, and though he did not win, there was a noticeable return of his old abundance of speed.
That is exactly what propelled him to that long-awaited return to winning ways on Friday. One of the best away, Doraemon (Chan Wei Sheng) was, however, eased off the speed to drop anchor outside the more fleet-footed Happy Princess (Corey Brown) before applying the pressure again at the point of turn.
In the blink of an eye, Doraemon shot past Happy Princess and sprinted away to a commanding two-length lead. Though he felt the wobbles a little towards the end, he had pinched too much of a break to be pegged back, scoring by 1 ¼ lengths from Happy Princess with Harden Up (Koh Teck Huat) third another three parts of a length away. The winning time was 1min 0.37secs.
“He’s a Poly horse who’s had many leg problems over the years, but the owner is very patient and has always liked him,” said Khoo.
“He’s got plenty of speed and he’s best ridden forward. The other horse was faster and Desmond (Chan) did a good job to take a drop and wait.
“He’s really improved on his riding this kid. He doesn’t just whack away like he used to and rode this horse very well to the line.”
Chan said Doraemon’s natural gate speed was a huge factor in the win and all he did was to steer him in the right direction.
“The other horse had a better barrier and was quicker than us. As she had a bigger weight (58kg vs 52.5kg) I was not too worried,” said Khoo’s apprentice jockey.
“I just followed her throughout and at the top of the straight, my horse responded very well to win a nice race. I like this horse a lot.”
Now a nine-year-old, Doraemon has brought his record to six wins and 11 placings from 54 starts for stakes earnings in excess of $345,000.
