INFOGRAPHIC: CLICK HERE TO RELIVE 'MAGIC MAN' JOAO MOREIRA'S RECORD 145 WINNERS IN 2014-15
Pioneering efforts and extreme disappointments marked the fortunes of Hong Kong's topliners in a season quite unlike any other at home and abroad.
Nine of the 10 international Group Ones run in Hong Kong were won by locally trained horses, with French Hong Kong Vase winner Flintshire the lone exception, while the bauhinia flag was represented far and wide.
Rich Tapestry's American campaign set the scene very early. His Santa Anita Sprint Championship win in October was a watershed moment - a first victory for a Hong Kong-trained runner in the United States, let alone at the top level, and a rare defeat of American horses in the US on dirt. But his subsequent failure in the Breeders' Cup Sprint as favourite, when scoping with significant blood in the trachea, brought an ignominious end to an ambitious campaign.
Still, the greatest disappointment came late in the term with Horse of the Year Able Friend's failure at Royal Ascot, when he could only manage sixth in the Queen Anne Stakes.
It was clearly a sub-par performance from the horse they tagged the "Beast from the East" after a sublime season at home in which he briefly shared the title of the world's highest-rated racehorse and confirmed himself as the best horse Sha Tin has produced.
The giant chestnut cut a swathe through the mile ranks, taking the Jockey Club Mile, Hong Kong Mile, Stewards' Cup, Queen's Silver Jubilee Cup, Chairman's Trophy and Champions Mile while barely raising a sweat, and there appears nothing in his way to stop a repeat next term.
Stablemate Designs On Rome, his arch-rival the previous season, took a different path, heading for the middle-distance features and John Moore's big guns avoided a clash.
Last season's Derby winner did not make the same progress as Able Friend but improved to take the Longines Hong Kong Cup and the Citibank Hong Kong Gold Cup before a Sheema Classic fourth in Dubai.
After snaring the two sprint features at the Dubai World Cup meeting in 2014, seven horses made the trip to Meydan in March - three each in the Al Quoz Sprint and Golden Shaheen in addition to Designs On Rome.
Second, fourth and fifth in the Al Quoz. Second and third in the Golden Shaheen. Close, but no cigar.
Moore's Dan Excel was pencilled in for the Cox Plate, but a viral infection ruined his campaign and the first half of his season. He was followed to Australia by Dominant, who failed to make an impact in two runs during Sydney's The Championships.
However, Dan Excel recovered sufficiently to defend his title in the Singapore Airlines International Cup in May, the first horse to go back-to-back.
That same night, Aerovelocity added the KrisFlyer Sprint to his record, becoming the fifth Hong Kong winner of the race in the last seven years.
This followed wins in the Longines Hong Kong Sprint and Japan's Takamatsunomiya Kinen, taking the vacant mantle as the top sprinter in town and in the process, becoming the first Hong Kong-trained horse to win three Group Ones in three different countries in the same season. A US$1 million Global Sprint Challenge bonus awaits if he can win the Hong Kong Sprint again.
Still, he will have some competition in the sprint division. Gold-Fun reverted to shorter trips in order to escape Able Friend, winning the Chairman's Sprint Prize, while Peniaphobia proved himself both down the straight and on the circle with victories in the Centenary Sprint Cup and the Jockey Club Sprint and placings in the Hong Kong Sprint and Al-Quoz Sprint.
Trainer Tony Cruz dominated the Group Ones towards the back-end of the season, taking out the Audemars Piguet QE II Cup with Blazing Speed one-time UAE Derby winner Helene Super Star's Standard Chartered Champions & Chater Cup victory.
This season's four-year-old crop did not appeal as particularly strong, save for John Size's BMW Hong Kong Derby winner Luger. He may not be in Able Friend's class just yet, but if his health issues remain in check - a further heart irregularity will see him banned from racing - he will be a serious chance in whichever race he targets.
Still, it may be a year from now that we are talking about a true threat to Able Friend's throne with Size looking to hold as good a classic hand as ever, led by champion griffin Thewizardofoz.
Outside of the usual globetrotters, interest surrounds Caspar Fownes' dirt miler Gun Pit, who looks set for an international campaign next season, with the US, Japan and Dubai all possible.
