Decrypt using handicap as prep for possible run at Hong Kong classics

There are big hopes pinned to the little gray horse Decrypt, who makes his Hong Kong debut Sunday in the featured eighth race.

Decrypt is high-rated at 93 and carries top weight of 123 pounds, including jockey Zac Purton, in this 1,400-meter Class 2 handicap for horses rated 105-80. Decrypt races for the first time since May 25, when he finished third behind Phoenix of Spain and Too Darn Hot in the Irish 2000 Guineas.

The hope is Decrypt shows enough in Sunday’s start to make his way to the Hong Kong Classic Mile in January, first leg of the 4-year-old Classic Series, which moves on to the Hong Kong Classic Cup and culminates with one of the most important races on the circuit, the Hong Kong Derby. Frankie Lor trains Decrypt, and it was just last Hong Kong racing season that Lor, just a second-season trainer at the time, won all three races in the Classic Series: The Mile with Dark Dream, the Cup with Mission Tycoon, and the Derby with Furore.

It’s fair to wonder if Decrypt, a son of Dark Dream, will stay a distance longer even than the approximately one mile of Sunday's race, and this start comes after months of training and a pair of barrier trials (schooling races), the first over the Happy Valley turf, the more recent on Sha Tin dirt. Decrypt, who weighs in at 1,038 pounds, third-lightest runner in a 14-horse field, showed decent early speed in both his practice races and finished willingly enough while never asked for much.

The horses just beneath Decrypt in ratings, Dragon General and Joyful Trinity, are aging veterans of the circuit and not in good form. Beauty Rush, Little Bird, and a second Lor-trained runner, Superich, appear to have at least slightly more upside.

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