China Horse Club Arrives on International Stage

The emerging endeavors of the China Horse Club made a significant impact on the international racing stage at Kranji racecourse last Sunday.

Coinciding with the Chinese Lunar New Year, for the first time the Chinese Equine Cultural Festival (CECF) was held outside of mainland China, Singapore being the destination.

The event also marked the 25 year anniversary of diplomatic relations between Singapore and China.

But the CECF was more than just the staging of the richest race in Singapore’s 173 year history – the domestic group one CECF Singapore Cup over 1800m with prizemoney of $3.05 million.

The activities over two days comprised a CECF Charity Cocktail Party, Charity Auction of works by leading chinese artists, closed door shopping experiences and seminars for China Horse Club members.

Chairman and founder of The China Horse Club (CHC), Mr Teo Ah King established the Club in 2006 as a premier lifestyle, business and thoroughbred racing club to provide it’s members with never before experiences owning champion racehorses capable of competing around the world.

And while the membership currently stands at around 200, in the last two years the CHC has already made some serious inroads to the world of racing owning group one winners in Ireland, Britain, Australia and Singapore.

Despite these achievements, the racing industry seemed to remain unconvinced that the CHC was ready to enter the big league of thoroughbred racing alongside the powerhouses of Godolphin, Coolmore, Aga Khan and more recently the Qataris.

But on Sunday the CHC went some way to dispelling that perception, by staging a successful CECF Singapore Cup meeting.

After the race, CHC General Manager Eden Harrington revealed the whole concept had been in the planning stages for almost a year, but it was important to get everything right – the most obvious being how the race would be viewed by other racing jurisdictions looking on.

If the race was to have any standing and provide maximum impact in announcing the CHC as a major global player, it had to have a world class racing venue with the race being run under IFHA rules and sanctioned by the appropriate racing authorities.

The Singapore Turf Club was the obvious choice and together with the CHC, the race soon went from a dream to the reality witnessed on Sunday by several major players from numerous racing bodies and business leaders from around the world.

The CECF Singapore Cup comprised nine runners from differing parts of the world including Australia, US, France, Italy and Singapore under the care of leading trainers such as Christophe Clement, Nicholas Clement, Francis Graffard, Roger Varian, John Thompson, Michael Freedman and Jason Warren.

Add to this world champion riders such as Christophe Soumillon, Hugh Bowman, Blake Shinn, Tommy Berry, Craig Newitt, Corey Brown, Jamie Spencer, Manoel Nunes and Darryl Holland and you have the ingredients for a truly international contest.

However it did not stop some from offering disparaging opinions on the quality of the line up for a domestic group one, which in reality was quite strong.

But the fact of the matter was that every horse in the race had won to at least stakes level in their own countries before coming to Singapore while Tropaios was a domestic group one winner of the 2013 Singapore Gold Cup – there would not be too many local group one races that could boast a statistic like that.

Another sticking point for some participants was the fact the race was only open to horses owned and raced by CHC members.

One local trainer who saw merit in the Singapore Turf Club’s involvement was the respected Stephen Gray.

“I think the Turf Club has to be commended for trying new ventures and if there is a benefit for Singapore racing then I am all for it”, he told Racing and Sports.

While the concept of a “closed” race is new for Singapore – a vibrant racing body that allows horses to be owned and raced by people not living in Singapore, provided of course they pass all the appropriate integrity checks - such races in one form or another are successfully run in other countries.

Every horse was either owned outright by CHC members or in partnership with other members. For example one of the winning owners of Parranda, Bruno Wu has shares in another three horses. One was the former French galloper Auvray who unfortunately injured himself at the start before the Cup and was withdrawn.

The result of the race could not have been scripted any better with the highest rated Timeform runner in the field, US mare Parranda trained by Christophe Clement and ridden by world champion jockey Christophe Soumillon scoring comfortably from Zululand and Ming Zhi Cosmos.

Parranda is a genuine group one/two performer in the US so her victory was a major success for the whole organising team but above all for the CHC and its members, some of which had enjoyed a new experience of a life time being intimately involved in one of the great sports.

The CECF Singapore Cup was the second race meeting arranged by the CHC, the inaugural one being at Hohhot in 2013.

While the CHC has been active purchasing yearlings worldwide to bolster their racing stock, they have also been keen to export horses from China to race overseas.

“Once thought impossible it is now becoming reality, “ said Mr Teo. “Champion Chinese horses exported from China and raced by CHC members will race in the United States in 2015.”

“Alcott, who won the 2014 Hurun Report Cup, The Ferryman who won the 2014 Owen Glenn Sprint and Beat the Drum who won the 2013 CECF National Breeders’ Cup have cleared quarantine in the United States and are being prepared for stakes events and Grade 1 races.”

There is no doubt the China Horse Club has big plans to become a major international player in thoroughbred racing - the China Dream Project as Mr Teo calls it.

If the drive and enthusiasm shown by Mr Teo and his Team to all those who attended last week’s CECF Singapore Cup is any gauge, then the CHC and its members look set for an exciting time in the years ahead.