Impressive debut winner Joyful Hunter will aim to extend his unbeaten sequence to two when he lines up in the HK$1.08 million Class 4 Victoria Park Handicap (1200m) at Happy Valley on Thursday night (6 July) for trainer Francis Lui and jockey Vincent Ho.
Blitzing rivals by two lengths at the city circuit on 14 June, the Darci Brahma three-year-old turned heads with an electrifying turn of foot to score in fine style under Ho.
“It’s not easy to do that at Happy Valley and he had a bad draw (10). I wasn’t surprised, he sure had potential,” Lui said.
Amid yet another strong season, Lui has 58 wins to sit behind only John Size (73) and Frankie Lor (64) in the trainers’ championship, and he has been satisfied with Joyful Hunter’s condition ahead of his charge’s second start.
“I think he’s improved out of his first run. I think he has quality, but he’s still green. In the race he tries, you can see that in his first run that he won. He has a good fighting heart,” Lui said.
Joyful Hunter rose eight rating points to a mark of 60 following that effort, which came in a time of 1m 09.84s. The New Zealand-bred clocked 22.62s for his final 400m – the fastest winning final sectional time at the race meeting last month.