Until this year, Ricky Yiu Poon-fai’s big-race honour roll existed solely to accommodate a cohort of elite-level sprinters.

But, much like Alexis Badel’s ride aboard Hong Kong Derby (2,000m) winner Voyage Bubble at Sha Tin on Sunday, Yiu has gone against the grain during this year’s Classic Series with a galloper he bought himself.

A regular at the sales, Yiu has made a living out of tailoring his approach to a Hong Kong programme that favours sprinters and milers.

Of his 442 winners since the beginning of the 2012-13 season, Voyage Bubble was only the 11th to salute at further than 1,800m.

Interestingly, six of those have come in the past 12 months – with Natural Storm and Robot Warrior both winning twice at 10 furlongs or further – to suggest the veteran might still be adding strings to his bow in the twilight of his career.

Before Voyage Bubble’s Classic Mile and Derby victories, Yiu had never won a top-line feature over further than 1,200m – gallopers like Fairy King Prawn, Sacred Kingdom and Amber Sky delivering the 65-year-old with a string of Group One sprint successes.

Yiu had also never finished better than seventh in a Derby before Sunday and Voyage Bubble was only his eighth runner in the race in a career dating back to 1995, with nothing he’d fielded in the city’s most prestigious event in the past decade finishing better than 12th.

Time will tell if Voyage Bubble’s 2023 four-year-old series dominance goes down as an outlier for Yiu – it’s worth remembering he did start the Derby at $46 – but the trainer, who’s producing more winners now than ever, does continue to surprise.

Voyage Bubble wins the Hong Kong Derby.

Yiu’s best-ever season was his championship-winning 2019-20 campaign, where he amassed 67 wins, and his second-best haul was last season’s 53.

With 41 victories through 54 of this campaign’s 88 meetings, he could well sail past both those figures this term. Some time next season, it’s likely he’ll become only the fifth trainer to reach 1,000 Hong Kong wins.

Whether Voyage Bubble can continue his ascension after pinching a farcically run Derby remains to be seen, but there’s no doubt his trainer is ageing like a fine wine.

Champions Day to regain international flavour

With the highest-rated galloper to come out of Sunday’s Derby being Voyage Bubble after he was given a 10-point hit to see his mark climb to 103, and no other runners boosted into triple figures following their weekend efforts, it’ll be interesting to see just how many of the four-year-old crop push onto Champions Day at the end of April.

Romantic Warrior was among the Derby runners who made the immediate step up to Group One level last year and he made an instant impact by winning the Group One QE II Cup (2,000m). However, Danny Shum Chap-shing’s superstar did it at a meeting devoid of international competition.

The Covid-19 pandemic has meant the city’s second marquee meeting of the season – behind the Hong Kong International Races – has been restricted to local gallopers for two of its past three editions, but the Jockey Club has confirmed it is all systems go in 2023.

“I think what we can say about Champions Day so far is the level of inquiry has been very positive, and those inquiries have come from Europe, Japan, Australia, New Zealand and Dubai,” said Jockey Club head of racing product Greg Carpenter.

“The entries close [on Monday] and we’re still a little way out from the race, but given we weren’t able to welcome anyone here last year, I’m really excited we’ll have some quality international horses back again on April 30.

“When we were able to welcome horses here, I think the best we’ve done in the past four or five years is eight [overseas runners]. I think we’ll do well this year.”

It’s a far cry from the situation this time last year, when border closures between Hong Kong and the mainland meant the Jockey Club wasn’t even sure the Conghua-based local Group One gallopers would make it to Champions Day.

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