FRIDAY: September 9, 2022: HAWKESBURY trainer Tommy Wong has his sights fixed on a hat-trick with yesterday’s home track winner Speedy Song.
The improving four-year-old was a $21 chance and made it two in a row when he defeated Sky Ace ($8.50) and $2 favorite Raccolto in the Lander Toyota Benchmark 64 Handicap (1800m).
He had broken through at his 10th start in a Wyong Provincial & Country Maiden Plate (1600m) on August 28.
“There is another Benchmark 64 over 1800m at Hawkesbury on Thursday week, so most likely we will have a crack at that,” Wong said this morning.
“Speedy Song is going well, and improving with each run.”
Wong purchased the Your Song gelding for $13,000 at the 2020 Inglis Scone yearling sale for a Hong Kong owner, who decided a few months ago not to race him there.
Wong then purchased Speedy Song online in June for the same amount, and now races him in partnership with Marius Edwards.
Since the purchase, Speedy Song has earned $54,750 in prizemoney.
“I contacted his previous owner in Hong Kong, and he is okay and was pleased to see the horse racing so well,” Wong said.
“I took the tongue tie off him after he ran third over 1600m at Kembla Grange on July 16 because he didn’t like it.
“Instead, we put a cross-over nose band on, and it works well.”
Speedy Song, closely related to the now deceased former New Zealand champion mare Sunline (who won 32 of her 48 starts, including 13 Group 1s), has been ridden in both his wins by talented apprentice Zac Lloyd.
The gelding gave his trainer his first Hawkesbury winner since Victory Thunder scored in a 1300m Maiden on June 23, 2020.
“The owner took him to race in Macau after that, and he is still racing there,” Wong said.
Whilst Lloyd was successful on Speedy Song, he was fined $400 by RacingNSW stewards for using the whip nine times (four more than the permitted number) prior to the 100m in the following race, the St Johns Park Bowling Club Benchmark 64 Handicap (1400m), on runner-up Easy Rosie ($11).
. Hawkesbury’s leading trainer Brad Widdup has had to play “second fiddle” to Wong at Speedy Song’s last two runs.
Wong’s gelding beat Widdup’s Ra Ra Grandpa at Wyong last month, and front-runner Sky Ace yesterday.