Sky Darci has big weight advantage in Lion Rock Trophy at Sha Tin

Trainer Caspar Fownes has found a sweet spot, Sunday’s Group 3, $450,000 Lion Rock Trophy Handicap at Sha Tin, for Sky Darci’s first start since winning the Hong Kong Derby on March 21.

Sky Darci saw out the Hong Kong Derby’s 2,000 meters but probably prefers a shorter trip and gets one in the 1,600-meter Lion Rock, race 3 on a 10-race card that starts at 9:45 p.m. Pacific on Saturday (watch and wager at DRFBets.com). He also gets a major boost from the handicap conditions, weighted at just 114, 19 pounds fewer than top-weighted Ka Ying Star. The Hong Kong Derby is one of the most important races in the jurisdiction but is not a group stakes and is restricted to 4-year-olds, and even after winning it, Sky Darci’s rating stands at just 106, far below the top older horses on the circuit.

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Nineteen pounds from Ka Ying Star and 16 from More Than This, the top-rated horses in the Lion Rock Trophy, should be sufficient to get Sky Darci home under Joao Moreira. Sky Darci has plenty of speed, evidenced by a pair of 1,200-meter Happy Valley wins to launch his season, and he enters Sunday’s test a fresh horse, with two barrier trials (training races) having primed the pump.

“I think fresh, he could be a pretty smart sprinter, really,” Fownes told Hong Kong Jockey Club publicity. “That’s why this race is a little bit of a test for us, coming back and against older horses. But at least being a handicap, it should give us some sort of an advantage. It will certainly give us a gauge as to where we think he’s going to be and what distance we’re going to be training him for the coming season.”

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Fownes said Sky Darci could start once more this Hong Kong season.

Healthy Happy set the pace before fading to fourth of six last out in the Group 1 Champions Mile and should be a forward factor again Sunday, also under just 114 pounds.