Golden Sixty has obstacles to overcome in bid for third Hong Kong Mile win

To get No. 3, Sixty will have to overcome 14 and eight months down time Sunday at Sha Tin Racecourse in Hong Kong.

On the line is $4.1 million in the Group 1 Hong Kong Mile. Golden Sixty, one of the best horses ever to race in Hong Kong and the world’s top-rated miler over the last three years, won the Mile in 2020 and 2021 and was second in 2022 before coming all the way back to form and winning three Group 1s to cap his 2022-23 Hong Kong season. The last of those, the Champions Mile, came April 30, and Golden Sixty has not started since. If that wasn’t enough of a handicap, the 8-year-old gelding drew the outside post in a 14-runner field.

“I think I will leave it to the jockey. I think the horse knows what to do, he has run so many races, and it all depends on the situation,” trainer Frances Lui said.

The jockey is Vincent Ho, who finally at the end of the 2021-22 Hong Kong season abandoned his standard tactics aboard Golden Sixty. Ho typically held his mount far off the pace, and Golden Sixty managed to win with a furious late rally, with the outcome often seeming tighter than necessary. Golden Sixty has plenty of tactical pace, and kept closer to the lead, he has raced even more effectively.

:: Hong Kong: Free PPs, picks, analysis, replays, and live streaming

By ”so many races,” Lui means 29. Golden Sixty has won 25 of them and at one point put together a 16-race winning streak.

The gelding, by Medaglia d’Oro, had three races before his 2020 HK Mile win, two before the 2021 victory, and one before California Spangle beat him by a neck last year, but the audacious plan for months has been to bring Golden Sixty fresh into the Mile. Golden Sixty swam and trotted in the Sha Tin stable area throughout the summer, resumed racetrack training in early September, and has gotten in four training races at Sha Tin, three on dirt, the most recent a one-mile test over turf.

California Spangle’s most recent outing did not inspire confidence that he is up for a HK Mile repeat. Leading as the heavy favorite Nov. 19 in the Jockey Club Mile, California Spangle had no stretch punch, fading to fourth, beaten nearly five lengths, in a race run at level weights. Christophe Soumillon rides for the first time and figures to place California Spangle on the lead.

Top Hong Kong jockey Zac Purton once was California Spangle’s regular rider but Sunday pilots Beauty Eternal, who ran the best race of his life winning the Jockey Club Mile by a nose. Danon the Kid and Serifos, both from Japan, are the leading foreign hopes.

Post time for the Mile, the second of four Group 1s, is 3 a.m. Eastern on Sunday.

:: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.