HK JAN 30 - BEAUTY FLASH CLAIMS STEWARDS’ CUP

By Hong Kong Jockey Club | Monday, January 31, 2011

In a resounding confirmation of the improvement he showed when winning the Cathay Pacific Hong Kong Mile, Beauty Flash, owned by Kwok Siu Ming, trained by Tony Cruz and ridden by Gerald Mosse, won the HKG1 Stewards' Cup, first leg of the Triple Crown, at Sha Tin On Sunday.

In doing so the chestnut son of Golan had a much tougher test than that given him by his international rivals on 12 December.

In fact he had to call on all his new-found resolution to resist the late challenges of first G1 Cathay Pacific Hong Kong Cup runner-up Irian, and then of Irian’s less fancied John Moore stablemate, the ultra consistent Sunny King, who ran the race of his career to go down by just a neck in a gallant bid to collect himself a first Group One.

Hard though Sunny King challenged however, he found it impossible to get past Beauty Flash, who had taken the lead early in the straight then kept finding what was needed, and by the line the neck margin between the two was, if anything, beginning to extend once more.

Mosse paid tribute afterwards to his mount’s battling qualities: “A Group One is never an easy race to ride,” said the Frenchman, “But what I asked him to do, he did.

“Tony said to me ‘Give him a chance to breathe and he will turn the engine on himself’, and he was right.

“At the 200m there were horses going faster than me and I didn’t want to use the whip because he doesn’t like that. But he has such a big heart he kept quickening and fought them off.”

Cruz attributed the five-year-old’s improvement this year to the fact that his lungs are cleaner now than they were last season.

“Last year,” said the trainer “he had blood in the trachea almost every time he raced or trialled. This year he’s scoping much cleaner and I put that down to his being stronger now than he was as a four-year-old.”

Last season Beauty Flash seemed not to get the 2000m of the Mercedes-Benz Hong Kong Derby, but while emphasizing that “the (1800m) Dubai Duty Free at Meydan is his main target now” Cruz did not rule out the possibility of another crack at 2000m in the second leg of the Triple Crown, the HKG1 Citibank Hong Kong Gold Cup on 27 February.

If he does go for that race he will find himself again up against Irian whose trainer will feel optimistic about turning the tables.

“They just didn’t go fast enough for him today and he didn’t have that turn of foot to catch them,” said Moore of Irian, “but it was a nice prep for the Gold Cup and I would think he’ll be the horse to beat in that.”

Behind Beauty Flash today Sunny King of course covered himself with glory.

Moore pointed out that “The early pace suited him and you just know that when they go as steady as that at a mile he’s going to come flying,” although the overall time of 1.34.92 suggested the race was hardly a complete crawl.

There were encouraging performances too from Special Days who ran his best race of the season to finish fourth, while Champion Stayer Mr Medici ran exceptionally well to take fifth just in front of the veteran Good Ba Ba, who looked a real danger half way up the straight and still ran on well enough to show that even at nine he may have enough talent left to be a competitor in the top class.

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