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Connections made the right decision to start the three-year-old filly Aerolithe in the G1 NHK Mile Cup in Tokyo on Sunday.
Coming off a fifth in the G1 Oka Sho (Japanese 1000 Guineas) over 1600m, Aerolithe’s connections altered her target to the NHK Mile Cup instead of the traditional Yushun Himba (Japanese Oaks) over 2400m.
Aerolithe, ridden by veteran jockey Norihiro Yokayama, made steady headway after traveling wide and accelerated impressively to overtake the leaders and hold off a fast closing Rieno Tesoro for a 1.5 lengths victory.The win was the first G1 success for her trainer Takanori Kikuzawa, a former jockey with a career total of 639 wins who retired in 2010.
He opened his yard in 2011 and had four previous Graded race wins as a trainer coming into the NHK Mile Cup.Yokoyama has now won 26 G1 races but had not recorded a major since winning the NHK Mile with Clarity Sky in 2015.
“I felt she had great potential when I first sat on her in training as a two-year-old,”Yokoyama said.“She was in great condition coming into this race. She still appears to have a lot more in her and I expect her to be even more powerful in the autumn season.”
The grey filly broke her maiden as a two-year-old in her debut followed by a runner-up effort and was twice second in her first two grade-race starts this year in the G3 Fairy Stakes (1600m) and the G3 Queen Cup (1600m) before the Oka Sho.Race favorite Karakurenai under Mirco Demuro was a well beaten 17th.