Hong Kong Horse of the Year SILENT WITNESS (El Moxie) left nothing to chance
in his first try at 1,400 meters (about seven furlongs), shooting to the front in
Sunday’s Queen’s Silver Jubilee S. (HK-G2) at Sha Tin Racecourse in Hong Kong en route to a record 17th consecutive victory.
“He was just
cruising and turning for home I was very, very confident,” jockey
Felix Coetzee said. “I didn’t get to the bottom of him in the straight. He just did
it very easily.”
Silent Witness, who remains unbeaten in his career, was going beyond six
furlongs for the first time and just missed the track record while stopping the
clock in 1:21 4/5 in the Silver Jubilee. The Tony Cruz-trained five-year-old was
1 3/4 lengths ahead of Town of Fionn (Snippets) at the wire while making his
fourth start on the year, having already captured the Bauhinia Sprint Trophy
(HK-G1), Centenary Sprint Cup (HK-G1) and Chairman’s Sprint Prize (HK-G1).
The bay will now target the Asian Mile Challenge, the
Champions Mile (HK-G1) here on May 14 and the Yasuda Kinen (Jpn-G1) at Tokyo on June 5.
However, an
intriguing clash looms on the horizon as there has been a proposed match race
between Silent Witness and Horse of the Year Ghostzapper (Awesome Again), details for which have yet to be
hammered out.
“If it’s turf, we’ll beat him,” owner Arthur da Silva said. “If it
was on dirt, we could run that too. But let’s wait and see as nothing’s been
decided.”
Silent Witness beat the North American mark of 16 consecutive victories
shared by Citation (1948-50), Cigar (1994-96) and Hallowed Dreams (1999-2000).