Challenge of The Everest not over for KYR the WBS

Life moves quickly when it's feature race time and Ka Ying Rising's win in The Everest at Royal Randwick seems a long while ago, even though it isn't yet two weeks.

Within days of his momentous victory, the world's best sprinter was back out of the spotlight, away from the gawking eyes and probing questions of a voracious social media, and slipping quietly back into Sha Tin. David Hayes- star has already had his first morning on the track since his return, wit the aim to ready him for the G2 Jockey Club Sprint on November 23, the designated local lead-up for the Hong Kong Sprint on December 14.

His win at Randwick was the first there by a Hong Kong-based horse as well as the first win in The Everest for Hayes, jockey Zac Purton and of course the horse's owners.

The win put Ka Ying Rising on Hong Kong's honour roll in races overseas, an impressive list for a racing centre with a small horse population since Fairy King Prawn broke the ice by winning the Yasuda KInen in Tokyo in 2000. (I think this is a comprehensive list but no doubt there's been one that slipped through the cracks).

The victory also confirmed Ka Ying Rising's standing as the world's best sprinter - not an inconsiderable thing, given that, until then he had built his space in that role solely by performances in his own backyard.

That had been a not unreasonable criticism of him and other Hong Kong sprinters which had preceded him at the top of the world classification list - Silent Witness, Absolute Champion, Sacred Kingdom and Lucky Sweynesse.

To many, after having to travel halfway around the world, with the complications that entails, to win the world's richest sprint on strange turf, this would seem like the easy part - back in his regular accommodation and routine, on home soil and ready to dominate races that, on paper, are simply at his mercy.

Maybe it will be as straightforward as everyone imagines - as it has been for Romantic Warrior after his recent sorties overseas - but the history of Hong Kong's overseas feature race winners tells a less certain story.

No doubt, the most famous of them - and the most stark lesson on the downside of international competition - was Silent Witness. Hong Kong's Black Caviar was a big , powerful beast with a high cruising speed, who won his first 17 Hong Kong starts in sprint races, was narrowly defeat twice at 1600m, then switched back to a sprint distance to take out the Sprinters Stakes in Japan with authority.

Somewhere between Nakayama that day and his stable at Sha Tin, something happened to Silent Witness. Many suspected a virus, trainer Tony Cruz suggested the heavy sedation Silent Witness required for the return flight was the culprit but,whatever it was, he was never the same horse again, losing lengths off his extroardinary talent. He went from unbeatable to never winning again.

Another of Hong Kong's landmark foreign wins was Vengeance Of Rain scoring in the Dubai Sheema Classic - at that time, the richest turf race in the world.

When he returned home, he was towelled up twice by arch rival Viva Pataca. He was spell, returned for only three more runs the next season and finished his career pulled up with a heart irregularity at the tail of the field in a Group 3 the following year.

There's no clear pattern to the subsequent careers of the winners Hong Kong has had overseas.

As we said, it has all gone very simply and predictably for Danny Shum's Romantic Warrior, though things were different for his King's Stand Stakes winner, Little Bridge, who was retired two starts later.

But, as a bottom line, there have been only four of them which returned to win at their next race start, and two of those four are Romantic Warrior, so it hasn't exactly been a path to invincibility.

For the next chapter with Ka Ying Rising, we have to wait a few weeks. For Hong Kong's other overseas winner this season - Self Improvement, who won the Korea Sprint in Seoul, the test comes earlier but it's not a fair examination. Manfred Man Ka-leung's sprinter is entered for Happy Valley next Sunday in a Class 2 on turf - he has never won on any surface but dirt.