Well-known Australian racing journalist Gary Crispe proved a lucky charm to his horse City Of Kirkwall who outstayed his rivals to land the $35,000 Abundance Stakes, a Kranji Stakes D race over 2200m on Friday.
Crispe, CEO of the Racing And Sports website, is in town to cover Sunday’s China Equine Cultural Festival, and would have been pleased he killed two birds with one stone at Friday’s Chinese New Year meeting. With his trusty tape recorder and microphone still slung over his shoulder, he did not have to turn it on this time around, as he donned his owner hat to pose for the camera at the winner’s box.
City Of Kirkwall, a previous one-time winner (1400m) Crispe races with his brother Wayne, business partner Robert Vilkaitis and Kevin Talbot had been making headway when stepped up over more ground at his last couple of starts. Sent out as the $20 favourite, the Pentire four-year-old did not disappoint, given a peach of a ride by jockey Corey Brown for a comfortable 1 ½-length win from Super Joe (Nooresh Juglall) with Over Easy (A’Isisuhairi Kasim) third a nose away.
The winning time was 2min 20.21secs.
With trainer Stephen Gray in Japan holidaying with his family, Crispe was, for once, on the other side of the fence, giving post-race quotes at the winner’s circle. A civil engineer by training, the amiable journalist is not the sort given to delusions of grandeur, but certainly loves a quip every now and then.
“He’s bred to stay. They don’t have two-mile races here and we have to go for the Melbourne Cup instead!” he laughed.
“Wayne’s back in Australia and will be pleased with that win. We expected a good run from Kirkwall and he’s proven us right.
“We actually wanted to name him Kirkwall, which is a town in Scotland, but also the name of the stud where he was born in New Zealand, but it was not allowed and we added “City Of” in front.”
Brown said City Of Kirkwall was a genuine stayer who just keeps batting away, but is hard to restart once he gets a bit jammed up.
“There was no speed in the race, and I didn’t want him to keep skipping and changing his strides,” said the Australian hoop.
“He got knocked over at his last start and it took him another 100m to get going again.
“It worked out great in the end. Once he reached top gear, he was just too good.”
Assistant-trainer Peter Hutton said finding the right fit for City Of Kirkwall has been a bit of a challenge, but now that they know staying is his caper, the planning of his next races should be more straightforward.
“The key to him was to find the right distance. He confused us a little as we thought he was more a 1200m-1400m horse,” said Hutton.
“He had every chance to travel in a good spot. They set a slow pace to the race and it suited him. It’s all very exciting for him.”
City Of Kirkwall travelled on the outside of leader Over Easy for most of the gruelling journey, but still had a kick left up his sleeve turning for home. Though he could not pull away, he was in a commanding position all the way to the line.
Super Joe did not have clear galloping room but had no excuses as he did not really quicken well enough to threaten the winner.
One horse who suffered bad traffic in the home straight was Zenzero when he was squeezed between Pinyin (Zuriman Zulkifli) and Blazing Spur (Koh Teck Huat) at the 200m, but he already looked a beaten horse then.
