Explaining his aversion to socialising, Vincent Ho Chak-yiu was suitably succinct. “When I have to talk, it’s a lot of effort,” he told the South China Morning Post. “Harder than riding a horse, for sure.”
It is logical that one of Hong Kong’s greatest jockeys feels most contented on horseback. When Ho begins speaking, though, the personal takes and tales roll off his tongue.
He relives the day in New Zealand that he “felt completely dead” after riding 39 horses, explains how he bounced back last year from the traumatic brain injury that knocked him out for four days, issues a rebuke to the anonymous critics who “can’t even sit on a horse” and relates how hugging trees helps him manage a life of incessant scrutiny and judgment.
On the sacrifice and temperance that are built into his every day, Ho said: “I don’t like to go partying, because it’s noisy. I’m sensitive to alcohol, and I don’t like to drink.
“I don’t feel like I’m missing out on anything.”
No, Ho’s days are consumed with pursuing “my goal of becoming a world-class jockey”.
“My coach says I never switch off,” he said.
In school, Ho would lapse into daydreams about “jumping on horses”. After his focus switched to the flat, he would “visualise every day, even when I was in the shower” of ways in which he could refine his craft.
The strength, fortitude, drive and modesty that Ho has exhibited in the 20 years since he was accepted into The Hong Kong Jockey Club’s (HKJC) Apprentice Jockeys’ School were recognised last week, when the 36-year-old was named among the recipients of the city’s Ten Outstanding Young Persons award.
“It’s a great honour, but it’s for the whole Hong Kong racing community,” Ho said.
“My dad always told me that it was important to be respected, and to give back.
“I have to do well in my career, or I’ll have done nothing to inspire anyone, nor be able to give back to society.”
Ho was 13 when “the story started”, after his father spied a Pokfulam Public Riding School advertisement for budding equestrians.
“I always loved animals and, living in a concrete city, getting to ride horses was really special,” he said.
Among other activities, Ho had played badminton, table tennis and football, and practised martial arts, as well as trying the piano and Chinese painting.
“I wasn’t as good at any of them as I was at riding,” he said.
“My parents always let me try lots of things; they wanted to find my passion and talent.”
Ho reckons that passion, coupled with his latent ability, set him apart when HKJC whittled 1,000 candidates down to around 12, after his eagle-eyed dad also spotted the opportunity to apply for their apprentice jockeys’ school.
The “great resources, coaches and horses” supplied by the club hastened Ho’s development, along with the help of “my really great mentor”, the champion trainer, Caspar Fownes.
Still, before he could compete on home turf, Ho had to undergo an overseas rite of passage.
“We can’t just start riding straight off, because the gap with the experienced jockeys here would be massive,” he said.
After around six months in Australia, where the native staff would “support their own people first”, Ho asked to transfer elsewhere, which was how he ended up in Matamata on New Zealand’s North Island.
“In winter, it went down to minus 6 degrees [21.2 degrees Fahrenheit], which toughens you up,” Ho said. “You have to stay strong, adapt and be resilient.”
The 39-horse day entailed riding 10 on the gallops, before his agent drove him to Cambridge trials to mount 29 more. “I felt absolutely dead,” Ho said.
He recalls times when he would “travel in the truck with the horse for four hours, set it up, ride it, take off the saddle, wash and walk the horse, then travel back with it.”
All the while, he told himself: “I have to do my best and be back in Hong Kong as soon as possible.”
“I never thought about giving up,” Ho said. “I love riding horses, the feeling of winning and of overcoming obstacles. I like riding horses that other people can’t perform on, or make the horse listen to what they want to do, and I can.”
He recorded 44 winners during 12 months that, in hindsight, were “fun and essential”.
“In Hong Kong, we’re very privileged with all the staff who help us,” he said. “HKJC provides us with an incredible support network and facilities.”
There was a neat symmetry with his back-breaking New Zealand day when Ho managed 39 wins in 2010-11 to be crowned Hong Kong Champion Apprentice.
Nonetheless, it was his partnership with Golden Sixty, the horse with whom he will forever be inextricably linked,that propelled Ho to stardom.
His 26 wins on the horse, from 31 rides between 2019 and 2024, included 10 Group 1 victories.
“In his first trial, he accelerated through a gap without hesitation when I asked,” Ho said. “Not many horses are that brave ... They don’t have that turn of foot.”
It was to Golden Sixty that Ho turned as he recuperated last year from his fourth brutal fall in little more than 18 months.
A July 2023 tumble in Japan resulted in a fractured T5 vertebrae, whiplash and pneumothorax. In January 2024, a spill at Sha Tin left him with four fractures to the vertebrae in his neck, and a broken finger. At the same racecourse 11 months later, Ho was concussed after being dislodged from Super Win Dragon.
When he came off Oldtown, again at Sha Tin, on February 9 last year, Ho sustained a brain bleed and brain contusion, along with shoulder and neck fractures.
Ho remembers nothing of the following four days in an intensive care unit. During his seven-month rehabilitation, he was sensitive to noise and bright lights, as well as noticing a change in his ordinarily level temperament.
“I had an amazing medical team, the HKJC found my sports doctor in Switzerland [at the Swiss Olympic Medical Centre] and they were confident after seeing the scans that I would get back with no problems,” Ho said, adding that the “amazing” plant-based diet he has followed for the past eight years, along with endless days devoted to riding, physiotherapy and the gym, gave him further confidence that he would successfully return. “I never wanted to quit,” he said. “For me, riding horses is like drinking water and eating.”
Still, when it was time to literally get back on the horse, Ho went to “the only one I fully trusted”, visiting Golden Sixty at his retirement stables in Hokkaido, Japan.
“We know each other inside out, and I knew I wouldn’t get injured on him,” Ho said.
Back in Hong Kong, Ho managed “fearful thoughts” with the aid of a sports psychologist.
“Sometimes, in Asian culture, we think seeing a psychologist always means you’re ill,” Ho said. “But it helps you perform, and helps in everyday life.”
Ho has no residual issues and, with nine wins from 74 mounts this season, he is back up and running.
At the outset of his career, Ho would “get really angry” after a disappointing race, and “not be able to focus on the next one”.
“I learned that the next race is also important,” he said. “You put your life on it, and owners and trainers put their heart into training the horse.”
Equally, Ho has grown to ignore online critique.
“If you’ve done your best, it’s fine,” he said. “It’s like telling [Lionel] Messi or [Cristiano] Ronaldo how to kick a ball: ‘shut up’.
“Those comments come from people who can’t even sit on a horse.”
As a high-profile figure in what he views as “the number one sport in Hong Kong”, Ho “prefers not to go to malls or walk around Central”.
“Coming back from my injury last year, I demanded so much from myself that sometimes I got overwhelmed,” he said. “Now, I have one half-day completely off every week. I go into nature, do some grounding meditation, or go for a hike,” he said. “Sit in the park hugging a tree. Some weird stuff.”
Regardless of the achievements that led to him becoming the first jockey honoured in the outstanding young persons’ 54-year history, Ho said he was “not even halfway” towards the world-class status he craves.
“There’s lots to improve and it won’t be easy, but I’ll do my best,” he said.
Wise words from a man who does not like the sound of his own voice.
