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Aethero with a scintillating front running victory in the Jockey Club Sprint, becoming the 56th stakes winner for the sire Sebring.
Australian-bred gelding Aethero lived up to his billing as Hong Kong's next big thing with a scintillating front running victory in the Jockey Club Sprint (Group 2) over 1200 metres at Sha Tin on Sunday, becoming the 56th stakes winner for the late Widden-based sire Sebring.
"Mama Mia!" cried winning jockey Karis Teetan as he returned jubilant from a two length success aboard the precocious chestnut.
"It was unbelievable. The day I trialled him, he gave me the feel of a real champion. I rode Able Friend and this horse reminds me so much of him."
Trainer John Moore had predicted a track record and he was not far wrong: his rising star stopped the clock at 1:07.58, just eight hundredths of a second outside the great Sacred Kingdom's mark set on this day 12 years ago.
"The sky is the limit. When Karis got off he said 'he kicked like Able Friend!'" Moore said, referencing his past champion to whom his current big chestnut bears a striking physical resemblance.
Every top sprinter in town went to post for the afternoon's speed feature, including last season's champion Beat The Clock, two-time Hong Kong Sprint (Group 1) hero Mr Stunning, and last year's young gun Jockey Club Sprint victor Hot King Prawn.
Aethero, out of Encosta De Lago mare Pinocchio, was a $575,000 Inglis Australian Easter Yearling Sale purchase in 2018 by George Moore Bloodstock from the draft of Tyreel Stud.