DESPITE overwhelming changes, the Group 1 Champions Cup still fails in all notable comparisons to its turf equivalent the Japan Cup.

Since its inception in 2000 as the ‘Japan Cup Dirt’, it has been subject to core changes such as name, race distance, direction in which race is run and conditions of entry. All of which were done by the JRA in an attempt to attract and raise the race’s national and international appeal.

This tinkering has yet to reap any great reward with only one foreign raider this year going to post in the form of Hong Kong-based runner Gun Pit.

This year’s renewal which was held at Chukyo for only the second time, recorded an attendance of 33,062 which pales to the 102,960 witnesses to the previous week’s Japan Cup which was held in Tokyo.

Though still in its infancy, the Champions Cup has to contend nationally with the dominant popularity of turf racing. Internationally, there are also problems especially its place on the fixture list, being pigeon holed between the Breeders’ Cup and Hong Kong international races which have rendered the JRA’s attempts to improve the status of the race futile for the time being.

It is a race in great need of a headline-maker to further expose itself to the greater racing public. That result in a sense was delivered by the Katsuhiko Sumii-trained six-year-old mare Sambista.

The dark bay, who started at odds of 66/1, laid claim to the majority of the $1.6 million purse and furthermore become the first mare ever to win a JRA Grade 1 dirt contest.

The Mirco Demuro-ridden daughter of Suzuka Mambo responded willingly to all of her partner’s urgings to stay on best of all to take the 1800m contest by a length and a half in front of Christophe Lemaire’s mount Nonkono Yume. International contender Gun Pit finished a disappointing last of 16.

This most recent top-level win now brings Demuro’s tally to three for the season to date in addition to six other graded stakes wins. Currently he is fourth in the 2015 jockeys’ championship with 110 wins, just 11 behind leader Yuichi Fukunaga.

It has been an immensely successful maiden season for Demuro as a fully-licenced JRA jockey, cemented by the fact of only being licenced from the 1st of March which gave his peers a two month head start.