He may have passed his peak for this season, but Ambitious Dragon can still make history by winning the Triple Crown in the Standard Chartered Champions & Chater Cup today at Sha Tin. The Stewards' Cup and Gold Cup winner, Ambitious Dragon (Umberto Rispoli) will be the first to complete the Triple Crown in 18 years, only the second horse to do it and he will do it over 2,400m in the final leg, not the 2,200m that River Verdon had to run. The question is not whether Ambitious Dragon is too go
He may have passed his peak for this season, but Ambitious Dragon can still make history by winning the Triple Crown in the Standard Chartered Champions & Chater Cup today at Sha Tin.
The Stewards' Cup and Gold Cup winner, Ambitious Dragon (Umberto Rispoli) will be the first to complete the Triple Crown in 18 years, only the second horse to do it and he will do it over 2,400m in the final leg, not the 2,200m that River Verdon had to run.
The question is not whether Ambitious Dragon is too good for his rivals - he is. And the question is not whether he will stay 2,400m - his style suggests he will in this racing environment where true tests of stamina are rare once the races get beyond 1,600m.
Everything centres on whether Ambitious Dragon, or a close replica, turns up at 4.05pm today for his date with history.
Twice this season, Ambitious Dragon has gone off the boil - when he was flat and beaten into fourth in the Hong Kong Cup in December and then when there were extenuating circumstances to his failure in Dubai - and he bounced back well from the first, and tolerably well from the second.
Tolerably well because, although knocked down early in what was a slowly-run Champions Mile last start, he did make up ground cheaply along the rail on the turn and then closed off OK with the tempo against him but he was still outfinished by Glorious Days, and that is not Ambitious Dragon at his best.
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