Who’s made their presence felt through the first quarter of the Hong Kong racing season?

We’re officially a quarter of the way through the 2023-24 Hong Kong racing season – Sunday’s Sha Tin card was meeting 22 of 88 – and there’s been no shortage of action, so let’s take a look at who’s been demanding the headlines (and who hasn’t).

Purton sitting pretty despite slowdown

Zac Purton is sitting pretty in his customary spot at the top of the jockeys’ premiership. However, he’s not filling his boots as he has in recent seasons, with Hugh Bowman matching him in the early running, and the winners spread more evenly this season than last.

Purton’s 31 wins put him on track for 124 – still a superb return but one that would be his lowest season tally since 2016-17 – and he’s 20 victories short of where he was at this point last campaign on his way to his record-breaking 179 successes.

Karis Teetan is churning out the victories after his injury-interrupted 2022-23 season and sits second with 21 wins, while Bowman – also on 21 – is hanging on to third despite missing the best part of a month through suspension and injury.

Overall, there are three added jockeys with five or more wins compared to this time last season and one extra jockey in double figures, with apprentice Angus Chung Yik-lai (17) and relative Hong Kong newcomers Andrea Atzeni (12) and Brenton Avdulla (10) and also among those who have impressed.

On the other side of the coin, the winless Luke Currie and Matthew Poon Ming-fai (three) are a couple who have disappointed so far.

In-form Ng clears out

John Size holds the record for the most wins by a trainer in a season with 94, and it would take something remarkable for someone to better that this campaign. However, the white-hot Pierre Ng Pang-chi is currently well on track after his blistering start.

With 26 victories to his name, second-season handler Ng sits 10 wins clear of Francis Lui Kin-wai and Caspar Fownes at the top of the trainers’ premiership and has been a force to be reckoned with so far this campaign with a winning strike rate of 17 per cent.

Douglas Whyte and Danny Shum Chap-shing have also impressed with 15 wins apiece, while Jimmy Ting Koon-ho has endured a horrid time of it with only one triumph.

Tony Cruz (10 wins), David Hayes (nine) and Jamie Richards (six) are among the handlers who would like more winners at this stage, while rookie trainers Mark Newnham (six wins at 12 per cent) and Cody Mo Wai-kit (four at 10 per cent) are near the bottom of the championship but boast strike rates that suggest the winners will start to flow more readily as the season progresses.

Stewards’ room a hive of activity

Jockey Club chief steward Marc van Gestel has certainly made his presence felt early in his first full season, meting out a string of lengthy suspensions.

Vincent Ho Chak-yiu (10 meetings reduced to eight on appeal) and Matthew Poon Ming-fai (six meetings) have felt Van Gestel’s wrath for failing to ride their mounts out in the last stride of races, while Harry Bentley, sidelined for two months because of improper conduct, received the lengthiest ban.

Ho described his sanction as a “stiff penalty”, and it’s hard to disagree, but if nothing else, the jockeys certainly know where they stand when it comes to a finish, while Bentley can count himself lucky after admitting to using a burner phone to communicate information about horses.

Chief steward Marc van Gestel.

That said, now that the dust has settled on the Bentley saga, one feels stewards could have handled things a little differently from the outset.

In his statement on social media, Bentley – who arrived in the city in April 2021 – confirmed his improper conduct was “an isolated incident, which occurred when I was new to Hong Kong and the racing scene”.

Did stewards need to immediately stand Bentley down, allowing rumours to fester for more than a week while they deliberated a case involving behaviour from two years ago, or could they have let him keep riding, done their business in the background and gone public once they had reached their verdict?

On the plus side, there have been a number of jockeys given deductions on careless-riding suspensions because of Van Gestel’s new system that rewards good records.

HKIR exciting despite missing pieces

There will be a couple of pieces missing from the Longines Hong Kong International Races, but there’s enough among the fields to ensure four ultra-competitive Group One races during the city’s biggest race day on December 10.

The absence of any Australian gallopers is a sore point with officials, and the Jockey Club had hoped to bring Frankie Dettori to town, while one wonders if they missed a trick by not including the retiring Damien Oliver in the International Jockeys’ Championship.

But with British star Highfield Princess jetting in to tackle Lucky Sweynesse and Wellington, Aidan O’Brien’s Luxembourg preparing to shape up to Romantic Warrior, and the usual swag of Japanese stars, the day promises to be a belter.