Ka Ying Rising Chases 21st Win In Chief Executive's Cup
Eyes On A Third Chief Executive's Cup
Ka Ying Rising headlines the 2026/27 season-opening card at Sha Tin Racecourse on 6 September 2026, bidding to extend his winning run to 21 consecutive victories in the HKSAR Chief Executive's Cup (Handicap). The 6YO gelding, trained by David Hayes and ridden by Zac Purton, has won this race twice, in 2024 and 2025, and returns for a third straight attempt in a contest that now carries Group Three status for the first time.
The Gr.3 HKSAR Chief Executive's Cup (Handicap) is the feature of the season-opening card, run as Race 3 over 1200 metres on turf at Sha Tin at 9.30am GST (1.30pm HKT), upgraded from Class 1 for the 2026/27 season with prize money raised to US$538,000 (HK$4,200,000). Ka Ying Rising, a 6YO gelding trained by David Hayes and ridden by Zac Purton for the Ka Ying Syndicate, carries topweight of the six-horse field, conceding the maximum 20lb to his rivals as he bids to extend a run of nine Group One victories into a 21st straight win overall.
Five horses oppose him. Copartner Prance, trained by Francis Lui Kin-wai, was runner-up to Ka Ying Rising in last year's renewal and finished eighth in this year's Gr.3 Premier Handicap. Lucky With You, trained by Frankie Lor Fu-chuen, and Magic Control, trained by Cody Mo Wai-kit, both went under to Ka Ying Rising in his most recent barrier trial. Patch of Theta, trained by Manfred Man Ka-leung, arrives off consecutive wins, the latest in the Gr.3 Sha Tin Vase. Tomodachi Kokoroe, trained by Hayes, lines up as Ka Ying Rising's own stablemate.
Ka Ying Rising is ranked joint No. 1 in the Longines World's Best Racehorse Rankings as of 13 August 2026, a status that has followed him from Sydney back to Sha Tin. Purton, who has ridden Ka Ying Rising in 19 of his 21 victories — Karis Teetan has partnered him for the other two — captured a ninth Hong Kong riding championship in 2025/26 with 143 wins, including four Group Ones aboard Ka Ying Rising, and became the first jockey in the city's history to pass 2,000 winners. "The way that he tore through the back end of last season, I'd like to think that he's got another 12 months at that level, and if that's the case, it really puts him in the stratosphere of some of the all-time great horses that we've seen," Purton said.
Purton Says He Feels Six Years Fitter
Zac Purton begins his 20th campaign in Hong Kong, the city he has lived in since he was 24, and returns from a summer break in Singapore and Indonesia describing his body as "the best I've felt for about six years," even with a pre-season regimen that runs to around five hours of fitness work a day. "The start of a season is always the hardest," Purton said. "I've got a limited amount of time to get as fit as I can as quickly as I can, so it's just pushing as hard as I can every day leading into the start of the season."
That sharpness mattered this week. David Hayes, a two-time Hong Kong champion trainer, confirmed a minor fright in the days before the race. "I think he kicked his concrete feed bin, and bruised his hind foot. He was definitely sore on Monday," Hayes said. Doppler scans, CT scans and an X-ray came back clear, and Hayes worked the gelding over an easy 400 metres on the Sha Tin dirt in 25.4 seconds on the Thursday morning before the race. "I was shattered on Monday morning, but I'm very happy today," Hayes said. Purton has watched Ka Ying Rising grow through the year. "He's a bigger, heavier, stronger horse now than what he was back then," Purton said. "We've seen that when he went to Australia, he developed down there, and he continued to get bigger and stronger as the season went on. And it was a good sign that he got even bigger in Conghua when he had that break."
One Leg The Whole Way Up The Straight
Purton's read on the gelding's condition was formed partly by a barrier trial on 30 August 2026, where Ka Ying Rising worked over 1000 metres up the straight. "Even watching his trial back from last week, he just looked like a bigger horse amongst the other horses in that trial, whereas early on in his career, he looked like he was out of place against the better horses, but now he's looking like he's the one that stands out," Purton said. One detail from the trial still puzzled him. "He was on one leg the whole way, which is frustrating. How does a horse go 1000m up the straight on one leg? Normal horses can't do it, but he's got to sort that out when he gets back to the races," the jockey said, referring to the gelding's failure to change legs during the workout.
Hayes read the same trial more straightforwardly, as evidence of fitness in hand: Ka Ying Rising had gone three or four seconds below course record time without changing legs, doing it easily enough that the trainer liked what he saw beforehand and expects him ready to run.
Beyond the Chief Executive's Cup, a travel plan is already in place. Ka Ying Rising will enter quarantine in Hong Kong for two weeks after the race before flying to Sydney to defend his title in the US$13.0 million (AU$20 million) G1 The Everest at Royal Randwick on 17 October 2026, where he became the first overseas runner to win the race in 2025. The Sha Tin outing therefore doubles as a season opener and a staging point on a route that already spans two countries and two Group One-calibre targets within weeks of each other.
That itinerary underlines how central the New Zealand-bred gelding has become to Hong Kong's international profile. Foaled on 3 September 2020 by Shamexpress out of Missy Moo, Ka Ying Rising has gone from a lower-grade Chief Executive's Cup winner in 2024 to a dual-hemisphere Group One force whose travel schedule is now built around global feature races rather than the local calendar alone.
The season itself opens with ceremony before it opens with racing. Admission to Sha Tin opens at 6.30am GST (10.30am HKT), with the traditional eye-dotting and gong-striking rituals taking place in the Parade Ring at 7.15am GST (11.15am HKT). The Hong Kong Jockey Club (HKJC) Year of the Horse Ambassador, Aaron Kwok, will deliver the first live performance of the season's new theme song, "Go Go Go", before all jockeys attend the opening event of the ten-race card, the Class 5 Glenealy Handicap, at 8.30am GST (12.30pm HKT). The day also carries simulcast coverage of Japan's Gr.2 Centaur Stakes and South Korea's Gr.3 Korea Sprint, both featuring Hong Kong-trained runners on the same afternoon.
A 21st straight win would stand alone as a Hong Kong record, surpassing Ka Ying Rising's own current mark and extending a run that already spans two seasons, two hemispheres and, with the 2026 upgrade, two grades of the same race. A Group Three promotion, a joint No. 1 world ranking, and a champion jockey riding fitter than he has in years all converge on the same Sha Tin afternoon. Whatever fright the feed bin gave his connections earlier in the week, it did not linger; the number 21 remains to be settled against five rivals on the track.