For Danny Shum, training Romantic Warrior is more than just a job and maybe even more than a passion. It’s his entire life.
I was Danny’s stable jockey back in 2005–06 and I got to know him well. He was a workaholic then and he still is now. First one at the stables in the morning, last one to leave. Always asking questions and never satisfied. He learned from Ivan Allan and John Moore, two of the most successful Hong Kong trainers ever, but Danny was never content just copying what someone else did. He wanted to understand how and why things worked.
The result of that curiosity, combined with the obsessive work ethic and a lot of courage, is what we are seeing now with Romantic Warrior, nearly 20 years later.
What impresses me most is the way Danny has been able to prepare this horse to perform consistently at the highest level, time and time again, under completely different conditions.
Getting a horse to win first-up over 2000 metres at the elite level is not easy. Getting that same horse to back it up three weeks later and peak again is something else entirely. Most horses can run very well fresh. But that first run can knock them around because they over-exert and do too much. Second-up, there’s often a dip. You see it all the time – horses run enormous first-up and don’t repeat the performance.
Danny has mastered Romantic Warrior so that he does repeat his first-up runs. That usually isn’t done over 2000m in Hong Kong or Australia. It’s an exceptional training achievement and one that often isn’t credited enough.
Romantic Warrior should have won the Saudi Cup – everyone knows that – but getting beaten didn’t lower his colours. If anything, it showed Danny’s courage as a trainer. He took on the best dirt horse in the world in Forever Young and he’s prepared to do it again.
That tells you everything about Danny Shum.
The horses always come first with him. He’s deeply invested in results, but never at the expense of the animal. When I rode for him early on, all he wanted to do was improve and get better. That mindset hasn’t changed – the results have simply caught up with the ambition.
Sunday’s Hong Kong Cup was Romantic Warrior’s fourth in a row. Each one required something different. Different preparation. Different pressure. Different expectation. This time it came after Romantic Warrior had been nursed back from leg surgery, second-up after a seven-month break.
Look at the journey. Danny took him to Australia for the 2023 Cox Plate. Romantic Warrior was beaten first-up in the Turnbull Stakes and people said he wasn’t that good, which was a load of rubbish. Then he won the Cox Plate when he wasn’t even at his best. We all knew that, but Danny still got him there. Then he brought him back to Hong Kong and had him ready to perform again, first-up, at the top level. Since that Turnbull Stakes fourth, Romantic Warrior has won nine from 11 and his two defeats were in Saudi Arabia against Forever Young and when he was beaten by a nose by Soul Rush in Dubai.
Danny doesn’t dodge anyone. He could take the easy path, stay local and keep winning big money races at Sha Tin. Instead, he races overseas – Australia, Japan, Dubai – racing on turf and dirt, against the best dirt horse in the world no less – and now he’s going back for another shot.
Why couldn’t he win the Saudi Cup next time? James McDonald has ridden the track now. The horse has raced on it. They’re both better for the experience.
What Danny Shum has achieved with Romantic Warrior is extraordinary, and he might not be done yet.
International Day: The Fence Was Off
There’s been plenty of talk about the track at the Hong Kong International Races, specifically how much worse the inside was.
I suspect the track was over-watered. The fence was off. You could tell very early in the day. Horses that looked like winning were beaten out of sight when they stayed on the fence. That doesn’t happen unless something’s wrong.
After the first race, you knew. My tips going to the races were one thing. After race one, they were totally different because of the way the track was. Horses that mapped perfectly on the fence suddenly lost three or four lengths straight away. Their advantage was gone.
I thought Star Rise couldn’t get beat in race nine. I thought Majestic Valour was a good thing in the third. Both of them raced on the inside and both of them were well beaten. To me, it’s impossible for those two horses to have finished as far back as they did. I had to put it down to the track.
In the Hong Kong Mile, My Wish was always going to struggle once I saw how the track was playing. I had him favorite after he drew gate two, but as soon as I saw the fence was off, he lost three lengths straight away. His advantage of drawing barrier two and being on the fence, third, was gone. It didn’t matter because he wouldn’t have won anyway, he just didn’t go well enough.
Riders had to adjust. Get off the rail. Get into the better ground. Even if it meant conceding position. Some jockeys worked it out quickly. Others didn’t, and they paid the price.But it didn’t detract from great racing throughout the day. The best horses won the big races. The four HKIR Group 1 favorites all won. The top horses won because they were the best horses, not because the track gifted them anything.
That’s racing. Tracks change. You adjust. And when it really matters, class still tells.
Fast Network Could Be Ka Ying Rising’s Cape Of Good Hope
Fast Network is a good horse – maybe even a Group 1 winner somewhere else other than when he runs into Ka Ying Rising.
Fast Network ran third behind Ka Ying Rising in the Hong Kong Sprint, and there’s no disgrace in that at all. He’s very good, but the problem is he’s running into what could be the greatest sprinter of all time.
If Dennis Yip does decide to take Fast Network to Dubai, it could be a very smart move – provided he travels well. It reminds me of Cape of Good Hope and Silent Witness. Cape of Good Hope couldn’t beat Silent Witness either. So instead of just lining up for place money every time, they took him around the world. He won a Group 1 in Australia and he won a Group 1 in England. And in doing that, he showed everyone just how great Silent Witness really was.
Fast Network could do the same thing for Ka Ying Rising. He’s a proper horse. If he travels, he’ll show his own quality – and he’ll underline just how high the bar is back home in Hong Kong.
That’s what happens when you’ve got a true champion. The very good horses keep running into something they just can’t get past. And when those good horses go out and beat the rest of the world, everyone realises what they’ve been up against.
Flavien Prat Has Been On The HKJC Radar
In last week’s column I nominated Flavien Prat as the jockey I would most like to see in Hong Kong.
While I was at the races on Sunday at Sha Tin I was told by a Jockey Club official that Flavien Prat has been approached on numerous occasions but at this stage declined.
We can only hope that one day we can see him in Hong Kong. ∎
