Hello Pretty could be the next big thing in Hong Kong racing if the face value of his startling trial win at Sha Tin on Friday can be accepted.
The Group Two Derby Trial hero was transferred to Tony Cruz during the off season and the slow-maturing chestnut has finally gained the strength to match his undoubted ability.
In the first of four heats over 1,200 metres on the all-weather, Hello Pretty bounced straight to the lead for jockey Brett Prebble and enjoyed his dictating role. High-class stablemate Bullish Luck came at him at the top of the home stretch and looked set to make a race of it but the contest was snuffed out quickly as soon as Prebble let Hello Pretty go.
The son of Distorted Humor immediate found another gear and opened up as only good horses can. Ultimately, he hit the line a huge margin, official 51/2 lengths, ahead of Bullish Luck, who then had 31/2 lengths to spare over third-placed Green Treasure.
The clock was plainly telling us the quality of this performance. Hello Pretty's winning time of 1:11.4 was 0.9 seconds faster than the average time of the four trial winners. His final 400m of 23.6 seconds was a full second faster than the average of the four final splits.
The only other trial winner this term to rate that highly was Natural Blitz on September 2, and it should be remembered he was racing on the same course over which he won the Hong Kong Sprint last December. Bullish Luck, who hasn't raced since winning the Yasuda Kinen on June 4, was handled by apprentice Jacky Tong Chi-kit. The multiple Group One winner has a great constitution and will probably take a race or two to get him to peak fitness.
Green Treasure is now prepared by Caspar Fownes. The big Danehill gelding showed good finishing speed to come from well back in the field and he worked to the line well under Shane Dye's urgings.