Guides · Thu 29 Oct 2026
LONGINES Hong Kong International Races: the big day at Sha Tin
Sunday 13 December at Sha Tin Racecourse: four Group 1 races, horses flown in from every major racing nation, and the richest afternoon of the Hong Kong season. A first-timer's guide to how the day works.
Every December, Hong Kong racing stops being a local sport for one afternoon and becomes the world's. The LONGINES Hong Kong International Races run at Sha Tin Racecourse on Sunday 13 December 2026, confirmed on the Hong Kong Jockey Club's official race hub, which bills the meeting as the World Turf Championships. Four Group 1 races on one card draw horses, jockeys and trainers from Japan, Europe, Australia and North America to race Hong Kong's best on their home turf. If you go to one race day in Hong Kong, this is the one the calendar is built around.
The four races
The card is built from four championship races at four tests. The LONGINES Hong Kong Sprint, over 1,200 metres, is usually the purest speed contest of the day. The Hong Kong Mile, over 1,600 metres, has been the race of Hong Kong's great milers. The Hong Kong Cup, over 2,000 metres, is the richest of the four and the day's headline. The Hong Kong Vase, over 2,400 metres, opens the Group 1 run and often goes to a European stayer. Around them sits a full support card, so the day builds across a full afternoon rather than hinging on a single race: arrive for the undercard, and the four championship races land through the middle of the day.
The week that leads in
The meeting is the end of a build-up that starts three weeks earlier. On Sunday 22 November, Jockey Club Cup Day at Sha Tin runs the local trials, the Jockey Club Cup, Mile and Sprint, where Hong Kong's international runners stake their claims. The final week belongs to the visitors: the LONGINES International Jockeys' Championship lights up Happy Valley on Wednesday night, 9 December, with star riders from around the world competing across four races, and the barrier draw for the big day follows on 10 December. If your trip spans both Sundays, the trial day is the connoisseur's version: the same course, a fraction of the crowd, and the storylines set before the world arrives.
Going to Sha Tin
The train is the way in. On race days the MTR's East Rail line serves Racecourse station, which opens for meetings and puts you inside the course; on other days, Sha Tin and Fo Tan stations are the walkable alternatives, and our Sha Tin guide covers the district. Most visitors watch from the public enclosures: grandstand views of the home straight, the parade ring where the horses circle before each race, and the weighing room and winner's enclosure by the finish. There is no strict dress code in the public enclosures, smart casual is the local habit, and admission and catering run on Octopus and card payments rather than cash. Do the two things regulars do: get there before the first Group 1 rather than at it, because the parade ring fills, and leave a race early or stay a race late, because 13 December is the day the whole season's crowd tries to board the same trains home.
Where to stay
Sha Tin has its own hotels within walking distance of the course, and staying in the district makes the day easy; the alternative is anywhere on the East Rail line, where the trip is one train with no changes, from Hung Hom and East Tsim Sha Tsui up through Tai Po. The hotels page weighs the districts for event weekends. One wider note for the racing traveller: this day closes the autumn half of a season that runs from September to July across Sha Tin and Happy Valley, and our season listing carries the full fixture picture. The last word, as always, is the organiser's: the Jockey Club's race hub carries the fields, the draw and the raceday arrangements as they are published.
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