Responding with a scorching 10.45s burst to the 300m, Ka Ying Rising spreadeagled the field to lead by almost 10 lengths before Purton allowed the gelding to cruise to the line over the final 100m, improving his overall record to 20 wins from 22 starts.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt [the win] is right up there, for sure,\u201d Purton said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe way the track is today with the strong headwind down the back straight and every horse that\u2019s been uncovered around the circle \u2013 he was on the fence, but he had nothing outside him \u2013 has just fallen in a hole. That wind has really gassed them,\u201d Purton said.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, he had to absorb that, and I suppose a few other horses had to as well, but things were there to try and unsettle him a little bit with the extra weight to carry, as well, coming back in distance but he\u2019s just different.\u201d<\/p>\n
Asked if Ka Ying Rising, who first shattered Sacred Kingdom\u2019s longstanding 1200m track record of 1m 7.50s with a gallop of 1m 7.43s and then bettered it again two starts later with a time of 1m 7.20s, could have gone even faster, Purton said: \u201cI wasn\u2019t out there to run time today.<\/p>\n
\u201cOf course, Stellar Express ran along and that set it up and I just got my horse into a lovely rhythm, and he let down so beautifully.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s the best he\u2019s accelerated at the top of the straight, so it was there for him to do it [run even faster], but I wasn\u2019t looking for him to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hayes believes Ka Ying Rising\u2019s maturity is a key in his continuing development.<\/p>\n
\u201cJust behind the gates and everything he does, he\u2019s taking it in so well, and to saddle him up, he\u2019s a quieter horse.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s just really maturing and it\u2019s been a golden year this year, but I think that he\u2019ll have another one next year,\u201d Hayes said, addressing a defence of the world\u2019s richest sprint, The Everest at Royal Randwick in Sydney, Australia after his 2025 victory.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think he\u2019ll be a better horse when he goes down for The Everest,\u201d Hayes said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ll just keep on doing what we\u2019re doing because it\u2019s working so well. It\u2019s not stressing our horse and we\u2019re hoping to have him for another couple of seasons, especially one more at the top, and he\u2019s nearly two-and-a-half years undefeated.<\/p>\n
\u201cZac\u2019s words, he said, \u2018I think he\u2019s getting better\u2019. He just said \u2018he loves taking a sit, if they go fast, he\u2019s a better horse. The faster they go, the better he is\u2019, those were his words.\u201d<\/p>\n
Unbeaten since February, 2024, Ka Ying Rising will attempt to claim a second Hong Kong Speed Series sweep \u2013 and bonus of HK$5 million \u2013 with victory in the HK$24m Group 1 Chairman\u2019s Sprint Prize at Sha Tin on April 26.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Responding with a scorching 10.45s burst to the 300m, Ka Ying Rising spreadeagled the field to lead by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":367103,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[77387,74,3595,6028,15293,6284,32565,69366,32666,192599,14568,192598,45124,64789,194,685,700,101,1132,111,139,2551,69,20792,10112,12816,3512,1974,8129,801,1957,25093,213,87086,87908,6100,78592,22974,3608,102,377,12820],"class_list":{"0":"post-367102","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-adequate","9":"tag-after","10":"tag-by","11":"tag-champion","12":"tag-continued","13":"tag-david","14":"tag-display","15":"tag-galloper","16":"tag-hayes","17":"tag-hk535","18":"tag-horse","19":"tag-imperious","20":"tag-improving","21":"tag-judging","22":"tag-kiwi","23":"tag-last","24":"tag-latest","25":"tag-left","26":"tag-million","27":"tag-new-zealand","28":"tag-newzealand","29":"tag-night","30":"tag-nz","31":"tag-phenomenal","32":"tag-power","33":"tag-purton","34":"tag-racing","35":"tag-record","36":"tag-reign","37":"tag-rising","38":"tag-scramble","39":"tag-speed","40":"tag-sports","41":"tag-sprint","42":"tag-sprinter","43":"tag-still","44":"tag-superlatives","45":"tag-track","46":"tag-were","47":"tag-with","48":"tag-world","49":"tag-ying"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367102","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=367102"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367102\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/367103"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=367102"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=367102"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=367102"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}