Beauty Generation not fully cranked for Celebration Cup

Beauty Generation was Hong Kong’s horse of the year during the 2017-18 racing season and is set to begin his next campaign Monday at Sha Tin in the Group 3, $415,171 Celebration Cup Handicap.

This is the same race that set Beauty Generation on a path to win the Group 1 Hong Kong Mile and the Group 1 Champion’s Mile last season, but while Beauty Generation was a comeback winner in 2017, both trainer John Moore and jockey Zac Purton spoke this week as if Beauty Generation would probably need this race to shake off rust.

Purton told Hong Kong Jockey Club publicity that Beauty Generation “feels a bit chubby” and “had a good blow walking back” following his most recent barrier trial (training race). Beauty Generation, at 126, also shares the top rating in the race with Seasons Bloom and must shoulder 133 pounds – 20 more than he carried in the 2017 Celebration Cup – while breaking from post 11 in the 1,400-meter race.

Moreover, there is plenty of competition in the Celebration Cup. Seasons Bloom’s 2017-18 season was cut short by problems in the starting gate, but at his best, he won the Group 1 Chairman’s Cup over one mile, a race in which Beauty Generation finished seventh.

The race also brings out two John Size-trained winners of 4-year-old classic-series races from last season, Ping Hai Star and Nothingilikemore. Nothingilikemore captured the Hong Kong Classic Mile, while Ping Hai Star made his stakes debut in the Hong Kong Derby and won it with a breathtaking stretch run. Four-year-olds in Hong Kong are somewhat like 3-year-olds in North America, and in Hong Kong, a horse must prove at age 5 that he is the equal of elders who have been racing in competition not restricted by age, and that is the task Ping Hai Star faces Monday.

The Hong Kong Derby is a 2,000-meter race and Ping Hai Star, who lacks any early speed, probably prefers distances longer than 1,400 meters, but Size was quoted this past week saying of Ping Hai Star, “There’s nothing he’s not capable of.”

All that said, Nothingilikemore could be the more dangerous horse Monday over the 1,400-meter trip. He carries just 119 pounds and won his first start last season going 1,400 meters at Sha Tin.

Size holds a strong hand in the co-featured National Day Handicap, another Group 3 worth $415,171, this one over a straight five furlongs. The 5-year-old Ivictory is the more proven of Size’s two entrants, having won the Group 1 Chairman’s Sprint Prize on April 29 to cap a 4-for-4 season, but all those wins came around a bend going 1,200 meters and Ivictory has not run a straight 1,000 meters since capturing his Hong Kong debut, a Class 4 handicap, in May 2017.

Still, last season’s leading rider, Purton, lands on Ivictory, while the mount on Hot King Prawn falls to Karis Teetan. Hot King Prawn, a 4-year-old, makes his stakes debut Monday after winning four times, twice at the Class 3 level, twice in Class 2 handicaps, during an exciting 2017-18 campaign. Hot King Prawn was dominant in all his wins and ended last season with a 2 1/4-length victory despite giving 15 pounds to the runner-up. He’s 5 for 5 in 1,000-meter sprints at Sha Tin and gets a considerable break in the weights from his Group 1-winning stablemate.

First post for the 10-race card is 1 a.m. Eastern. The National Day Handicap goes as race 7 (4:05) and is immediately followed by the Celebration Cup. You can watch and wager on the Sha Tin program at DRF Bets.

:: Hong Kong: Free PPs, picks, and analysis