Beauty Generation smashes his third track record
– Beauty Generation caned his rivals on his return to action in the Group Celebration Cup Handicap over 1400m at Sha Tin yesterday.
Hong Kong’s star galloper displayed imperious form at his first start of the season. The brilliant bay brushed off the burden of 60kg, as well as large weight concessions to all his rivals, and surged to victory in a track record 80.05 sec.
“He’s just an amazing horse. To do what he does defies logic to a certain degree,” jockey Zac Purton said. “We only just started to see the best of him at the end of last season so I believe he’s still got plenty ahead of him now.”
Beauty Generation now holds Sha Tin track records at three distances, with today’s 1400m mark standing alongside his 1600m time and, remarkably, an all-time best over 2200m.
“That’s the first part of the mission accomplished!” trainer John Moore said. “With the tail-wind in the straight today I thought he’d have to break a track record to give so much weight away to the others and he did.
“Zac said he felt it in the last 50 metres but that’s to be expected when you’re carrying 133 pounds and giving away so much weight.”
Beauty Generation’s victory marked him as the first to complete a hat-trick in the 1400m contest. Moore’s plan now is to follow the usual route to what he hopes will be a third win in December’s Group 1 Longines Hong Kong Mile.
“He’s won out of the box, he’s gone into this the heaviest he’s ever weighed-in in his life, off one soft 1000m trial, carrying the grandstand against horses carrying feather weights on their backs,” Purton said, with no shortage of awe.
“That was against him and then, as well as that, he had to run into the headwind down the back straight – it’s really strong and no other horse all day has been able to race on the pace and then been able to compete in the finish.”
There was talk last season of the champ taking his talents overseas. Moore is now keen to take that path before the campaign ends.
“He’s the best in Hong Kong and he’s one of the best in the world,” Moore said. “They’ve got to come to beat him in December and if the owner agrees, we’ll take him to Dubai and prove him on the world stage. That’s definitely in my diary, if everything goes to plan up to then.
“It’s the twilight of my career and I’d love to take him overseas and win a Group 1, to let the whole world see how good he is.”