Patience will be the key to the chances of Beauty Bolt in Sunday’s Classic Cup (1,800m) at Sha Tin, with his trainer Tony Cruz emphasising how crucial it is for jockey James McDonald to wait until the very last minute to pounce.
The Night Of Thunder galloper won his only start in Ireland pre-import for Joseph O’Brien and is yet to finish outside the top four in eight Hong Kong starts, with seven of those runs seeing him finish on the podium.
A mile winner four runs ago, he posted a career-best...View the full article
No disrespect to your knowledge but as an athlete in my teenage years on the Coast I trained and raced at all four tracks.
Omoto is also a swamp in the middle and any further development is constrained by physical barriers. Not to mention the periodic flooding from the Grey River which is one of those physical barriers.
Yes Kumara is built on pakahi flats however many farmers and science has worked out how to turn it into very productive paddocks. Pakahi soil forms over hard iron pans. The soil itself isn't that bad but the problem is drainage. Crack the pan and put in good drains you are fine.
The difference with Kumara is that there is acres of cheap land surrounding the existing course. Pakahi doesn't worry the building of infrastructure. You could very easily build a pseudo artificial turf track on the top of a hard iron pan.
Westland missed an opportunity to promote West Coast racing.