AROUND THE WORLD
Volume 1 | Week 7
🏆 TOMMY’S REPORT
Four stories. Three countries. One animal at the centre of it all.
Sometimes the best racing stories aren’t really about racing.
A young woman writes her name into 250 years of history. A pop singer dusts off his riding boots. One of Australia’s best-known trainers begins again in Hong Kong. And 54 horses walk onto a stage instead of a racetrack.
The Race Day Co passport has been getting a workout.
🇬🇧 Doncaster: 250 Years, and Finally a First
There are old races.
And then there is the St Leger.
First run in 1776, Britain’s oldest Classic celebrated its 250th running at Doncaster on 12 September.
Two and a half centuries of horses, jockeys, trainers and history had passed through the race.
But something had never happened.
No woman had ridden the winner of a British Classic.
Until Saffie Osborne.
The 24-year-old climbed aboard Highwayman, trained by Ireland’s Joseph O’Brien, having picked up the ride only days beforehand.
Highwayman wasn’t the obvious history-maker either. He started at 11/1 against a field containing some highly regarded three-year-olds.
But traveling into Doncaster’s long straight, Osborne had horse underneath her.
She sent Highwayman forward and suddenly the 250th St Leger wasn’t simply commemorating history.
It was making some.
Highwayman defeated stablemate Enceladus by two and a half lengths, giving O’Brien the quinella and Osborne her first Group 1 victory. More importantly, it made her the first female jockey to win any of Britain’s five Flat Classics.
And there may yet be an Australian chapter.
Highwayman is now being discussed as a possible Melbourne Cup traveler, with Osborne keen to retain the ride if the journey to Flemington happens.
Two hundred and fifty years to create one first.
Perhaps only a few weeks before another adventure begins.
🇬🇧 Doncaster: From Racing Silks to a Boy Band… and Back Again
Finn read this one twice.
Then checked the name.
Jamie Hamblett.
Jockey.
Fair enough.
Former apprentice to Sir Michael Stoute.
Impressive.
Rode for Queen Elizabeth II.
Very impressive.
Then Finn reached the next bit.
Pop singer.
“What?”
Hamblett left race riding and eventually found himself in an entirely different sort of spotlight, appearing on The X Factor and becoming part of the boy band Union J.
For most people, that’s probably enough career changes for one lifetime.
But roughly 15 years after leaving the saddle, Hamblett returned to Doncaster to ride in the Leger Legends, the charity race supporting the Injured Jockeys Fund and National Horseracing College. He prepared for the comeback with some useful help at home too: his partner is retired champion jockey Hayley Turner.
Hamblett partnered Berry Clever, trained by Chris Dwyer, a trainer for whom he’d ridden winners during his earlier racing life.
Finn put the phone down.
Some people reinvent themselves.
Others apparently keep all their old versions in the cupboard and bring whichever one they need.
Race Day Co approves.
🇭🇰 Hong Kong: James Cummings Starts Again
Imagine training more than 50 Group 1 winners in Australia, spending eight years at the head of one of the world’s great racing operations…
…and then deciding it was time to become the new bloke again.
That’s effectively what James Cummings has done.
The grandson of legendary Melbourne Cup trainer Bart Cummings has left his long tenure heading Godolphin’s Australian operation and begun a completely different chapter in Hong Kong.
Cummings entered the 2026-27 Hong Kong season with 42 horses in his care, joining one of world racing’s most concentrated and competitive training environments.
His first Hong Kong runner came at Happy Valley on 9 September, when Day Day Victory represented the new stable in a 1000-metre Class 4 handicap. Cummings had already made clear that patience would be part of the plan, with many new horses still settling into the stable.
It’s a fascinating change.
In Australia, the Cummings name is woven into racing history. James himself spent years associated with Godolphin’s famous royal blue.
In Hong Kong, none of that guarantees anything.
Sha Tin doesn’t hand out winners because your grandfather trained 12 Melbourne Cup winners.
You start again.
New horses. New owners. New system. New racetracks.
Same stopwatch.
For a trainer who has already achieved plenty, perhaps that’s precisely the attraction.
A new country.
A new stable.
And 42 new stories waiting to be written.
🇭🇰 Hong Kong: When the Horses Walk Onto a Stage
I just had to call Finn
“Is this racing?”
“No.”
“Dressage?”
“Not exactly.”
“Then what are we watching?”
I smiled
“Just watch.”
And onto the floor of Hong Kong’s Kai Tak Arena came the horses.
Not towards starting gates.
Towards the lights.
CAVALLUNA – Gate to the Otherworld, the large European equestrian production, made its Asian debut in Hong Kong on 10 September, presented by the Hong Kong Jockey Club.
It brought 54 horses together with international riders and performers in a production combining horsemanship, theatre, music and dance. The show includes breeds such as Andalusians and Friesians and disciplines ranging from liberty work to the spectacular Hungarian Post.
There were no bookmakers.
No photo finish.
No form guide folded into somebody’s back pocket.
Just horses and people demonstrating another side of a relationship that stretches back thousands of years.
Perhaps that’s why it belongs here.
Race Day Co spends plenty of time watching horses run fast.
Occasionally it’s worth remembering that the horse became extraordinary to humans long before anyone thought to put a winning post in front of one.
I watched for another minute, I was enthralled.
“So there’s definitely no betting?”
Finn didn't say a word.
“Tommy, really ?.”
“Just checking mate.”
