Sun Jewellery kept John Size in the championship fight by doing exactly what was expected of him in the final race at Sha Tin but left his trainer with a minor piece of juggling ahead going into the season finale.
The three-year-old's impressive debut win saw him a pronounced favourite at his second appearance despite rising to Class Two, but Sun Jewellery (Joao Moreira) didn't give anyone a moment's concern in coasting home by almost two lengths.
It was a crucial moment in the title race. A double for John Moore had already stretched his lead over Size to five wins and a shock defeat for Sun Jewellery might have made the gap look too big with 42 races to run but the chestnut cut the margin back to four and made it look doable again.
Now the question is which of Size's rising star three-year-olds he will run in the Class Two on the last day of the season - the only viable race left to Thewizardofoz, Amazing Kids and Sun Jewellery but a race which will probably see the Size runner favourite, whichever horse it is.
"A light weight, an inside run and Sun Jewellery did what everyone expected - we didn't learn a lot more about him today," Size said.
"Visually, it didn't appear that he had a tough run but it's a hot day, he ran the time and he won the race, so with all of that he is going to take some stress from it. How much we will find out in the next couple of days. As far as the race on the last day is concerned, there are no issues and I'm quite comfortable with what I'm going to do but it's a case of seeing which of the horses is OK to run again or not."
Moreira said that looks might have been deceptive as far as what was left in the tank even though he didn't press Sun Jewellery for his full effort late.
"I wouldn't say he had as much left as you might think watching him," he said. "But I was trying not to give him too hard a hard run in the heat, in case John wants to run him again. I'm looking forward to how this horse develops as he gives me a good feel and John obviously has some very nice horses going into next season."
