Lyle Hewitson is chasing an unlikely start in next month\u2019s LONGINES International Jockeys\u2019 Championship (IJC) at Happy Valley when he takes a full book of rides at the city circuit\u2019s midweek fixture tomorrow night (Wednesday, 23 November).<\/p>
Positioned sixth this season along with Luke Ferraris, the pair\u2019s 10 wins have them in contention to unseat Matthew Chadwick (12 wins) for the final spot on the coveted 12-rider roster \u2013 which will be finalised after tomorrow night\u2019s programme \u2013 that already includes Zac Purton, Ryan Moore, James McDonald, Hollie Doyle, Jamie Kah, Tom Marquand, Yuga Kawada, Mickael Barzalona and Jye McNeil.<\/p>
\u201cI\u2019ll be out there and I\u2019ll be competitive \u2013 I\u2019m happy with my book of rides. It\u2019s always hard to win three but I\u2019m out there as always to give every mount a winning chance,\u201d Hewitson said.<\/p>
The final three spots available are allocated to the leading homegrown rider (Vincent Ho) and the next two highest ranked jockeys on the local circuit, being Silvestre de Sousa (16 wins) and Chadwick, while Hewitson requires a three-timer to leapfrog the latter who has six rides on the card.<\/p>
\u201cIt\u2019s handy to have (a full book of rides) and to be honest, for once, I\u2019ve got some good draws. It\u2019s been a long time since I\u2019ve had a full book of draws except for the meeting that was unfortunately cancelled,\u201d Hewitson said.<\/p>
The affable 25-year-old from South Africa kicks off tomorrow night\u2019s fixture paired with Handsome Rebel for trainer Jamie Richards in the Class 4 Lam Tin Handicap (1000m).<\/p>
\u201cHe\u2019s got a gate that will be suitable to him. I thought it would be worth getting down to that weight to ride him. He\u2019s doing well for his age \u2013 he\u2019s got some fresh legs at the moment and he looks like he\u2019s enjoying his racing,\u201d Hewitson said.<\/p>
E Rainbow is coming to hand for trainer David Hayes and Hewitson will renew his partnership with the Australian-bred in the Class 4 Ngau Chi Wan Handicap (1200m).<\/p>[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column]
E Rainbow rolls into second under Hewitson.<\/p>[\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]
\u201cFrom last season he has matured a bit mentally, he\u2019s become a lot easier to work with and his start this season showed that,\u201d Hewitson said.<\/p>
The four-year-old finished second first-up this term under Hewitson.<\/p>
\u201c1000 metres is too sharp but we had to get him off a starting point and he was only half a length off them out of the gates. He lacks a little bit of that speed but I liked the way he worked into the turn and he sustained the run to the line.<\/p>
\u201cObviously he\u2019s going to be much more comfortable over six furlongs and with the run under his belt he should be good to go,\u201d Hewitson said.<\/p>
Hewitson has done the majority of trackwork atop E Rainbow, partnering the gelding in each of his dirt course gallops ahead of tomorrow night.<\/p>
\u201cIt\u2019s certainly a bonus (barrier three), he did have a few queries on his jumps last season (start of races) but I think he has improved in that respect, so as long as he jumps well and maintains a position then we should be a contender here,\u201d he said.<\/p>[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”32086″ img_size=”full” add_caption=”yes” onclick=”link_image”][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]
Jack Wong avoided injury last Sunday (20 November) at Sha Tin when he came off Highland Fortune in the penultimate race on the card and this week he heads to Happy Valley in search of a second win this term when he links with Faribault in the Lam Tin Handicap.<\/p>
\u201cI jumped out and the horse (Highland Fortune) just stumbled and then I lost balance and was falling off but I held on until the horses around me were past so that I had clear room to escape. Luckily nothing is broken and everything is intact, I\u2019m ready for Wednesday\u2019s races,\u201d Wong said.<\/p>
Wong has been in the plate for most of Faribault\u2019s trackwork and trials. Pierre Ng has applied blinkers for his first-up run tomorrow night.<\/p>
\u201cI really appreciate his (Pierre Ng) support, he tries his best to give me more horses to ride in races,\u201d Wong said. \u201cWe took our time with him because in the beginning he was laidback and his action was just ok but after a couple of trials he\u2019s kept on improving and I\u2019m looking forward to this race.\u201d<\/p>
Wednesday\u2019s (23 November) eight-race fixture at Happy Valley kicks off at 7.15pm with the Class 4 Lam Tin Handicap (1000m).<\/p>[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row]","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”32084″ img_size=”full” add_caption=”yes” onclick=”link_image”][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Lyle Hewitson is chasing an unlikely start in next month\u2019s LONGINES International Jockeys\u2019 Championship (IJC) at Happy Valley when he takes a full book of rides at the city circuit\u2019s midweek fixture tomorrow night (Wednesday, 23 November).Positioned sixth this season along with Luke Ferraris, the pair\u2019s 10 wins have them in… Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":32087,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_oasis_is_in_workflow":0,"_oasis_original":0,"_oasis_task_priority":"2normal","footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/campaigns.hkjc.com\/hkir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32082"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/campaigns.hkjc.com\/hkir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/campaigns.hkjc.com\/hkir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/campaigns.hkjc.com\/hkir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/campaigns.hkjc.com\/hkir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32082"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/campaigns.hkjc.com\/hkir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32082\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32088,"href":"http:\/\/campaigns.hkjc.com\/hkir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32082\/revisions\/32088"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/campaigns.hkjc.com\/hkir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32087"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/campaigns.hkjc.com\/hkir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32082"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/campaigns.hkjc.com\/hkir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32082"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/campaigns.hkjc.com\/hkir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32082"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}