Hong Kong Cup: Skalleti's long journey began on the margins of French racing

Skalleti’s first race came Oct. 7, 2018, at the Hippodrome Courbier on the outskirts of Nimes, a city in the south of France about 75 miles northwest of Marseille. The distance was 1 1/2 miles, the winner’s share of the purse roughly $6,800, the racecourse itself – which hosts jumps races, flat races, and turf harness races – a tiny drop in the ocean of European flat racing.

Skalleti, rallying furiously under jockey Antonio Orani (no, the name is not supposed to ring a bell) got up by about a neck (an official winning margin is nowhere to be found on the internet), and went home to trainer Jerome Reynier’s stables in Calas, a burg of about 2,000 some 13 miles north of Marseille.

Skalleti has come a long way from that quiet debut. He’s roughly 6,000 miles from home, spending this week at Sha Tin Racecourse in Hong Kong, and after 12 wins, two seconds, and a third from 16 starts, the 5-year-old gelding who began his career on the margin of French provincial racing starts Sunday in the $3.61 million Hong Kong Cup.

His is no vanity excursion, either. Skalleti in August, albeit while getting some weight, defeated Sottsass, who won the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe in October. The day before the Arc, Skalleti won the Group 2 Prix Dollar for the second year in a row, and two weeks later, on Oct. 17, started in his first Group 1, finishing second of 10 in the Champion Stakes at Ascot. Ahead of him was the soft-ground specialist Addeybb while behind him in third came the tremendous mare Magical, who went on to finish second in the Breeders’ Cup Turf and also is set to line up Sunday in the Hong Kong Cup.

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“On Sunday he needs to show he is up to that same level in very different circumstances, around two turns and on good ground and against opposition which is very used to such a setup,” Reynier told the France-based journalist Scott Burton, writing for the Hong Kong Jockey Club this week. “We beat Magical last time, but this might be more to her taste and we are here to see what we can do.”

Reynier has brought a second (and lesser) horse, Royal Julius, who runs in the Hong Kong Vase. Those two races are half the Group 1’s on offer Sunday at Sha Tin on the Hong Kong International Races program. Also scheduled are the Hong Kong Mile and the Hong Kong Sprint, both of which will have Hong Kong-based favorites, Golden Sixty for the Mile, Classique Legend in the Sprint.

Skalleti’s climb up the class ladder has been gradual. From Nimes, Skalleti moved on to winter all-weather track racing, winning two in a row at Marseille-Vivaux, a left-handed course with a six-furlong bull-ring oval. In February 2019, shipped to the all-weather track at Cagnes-Sur-Mer near Nice, Skalleti finished worse than third for the only time in his career, racing rank during the early stages of a listed race before encountering a cascade of trouble in the homestretch, checking in eighth of 16.

That was Skalleti’s last loss in 2019. He went on to win seven in a row, and when Reynier gave his horse a chance on a bigger stage, Skalleti responded by winning the Group 3 Prix Quincey Barriere over a mile at Deauville. Then came his first Prix Dollar, followed by a ship to Italy, where Skalleti was a smart winner of the Group 2 Premio Roma over 1 1/4 miles at Campanelle.

Reynier kept Skalleti to one-mile races early this year, Skalleti delivering a pair of third-place finishes in Group 3 competition before moving into the heart of his campaign in 1 1/4-mile races. Ascot marked his Group 1 debut and sternest test, but as in all previous instances, Skalleti rose to the occasion. Addeybb, who’d been second in the 2019 Champion, raced on or near the lead throughout the Champion, putting Skalleti in chase mode, and Skalleti, who possesses a powerful turn of foot he can deploy from various positions, could not sufficiently accelerate over really testing autumn ground.

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That said, Skalleti’s last seven starts have come over courses rated between good-soft and heavy, and he has shown himself to be adept getting over ground with plenty of give. Only once, in the Prix Quincey Barriere, has he raced over good going, but Reynier feels Skalleti can adapt.

“He is quite exceptional, and it is rare to have a horse that can win a Premio Roma and two Prix Dollars on heavy ground going right-handed, who can also win on the all-weather at left-handed Marseille-Vivaux and a Prix Quincey up a straight 1,600 meters at Deauville on good ground,” Reynier said.

Pierre-Charles Boudot has ridden Skalleti in six of his last eight races and has the mount again Sunday. Skalleti, a gelding who is easy to root for, trained with exuberance requiring no equipment beyond a bridle, bit, and reins, early this week in Hong Kong. His weight following his first long-distance ship looks good, and Skalleti’s trainer did all the heavy lifting preparing for the Cup before leaving France.

“I am quite confident,” Reynier said. “He’s a horse that never disappoints.”