Gibson targets HKIR treasure

“Frustrating” is how trainer Richard Gibson describes Giant Treasure and that label could also apply to the trainer’s season so far, a campaign that has yielded just two winners and sees him sitting incongruously at the bottom of the Hong Kong standings.

A victory in Sunday’s HK$23 million Group 1 Longines Hong Kong Mile would provide a welcome fillip for the man with an enviable record at the year-end showcase.   

“Every trainer wants to perform well on International day, no matter where you are in the trainers’ table,” he said. “A couple of years ago we had a treble on the card, so overall it’s always been a good day for the stable.”

Doctor Dino set Gibson’s Hong Kong ball rolling back in 2007, taking out the Hong Kong Vase at a time when the handler was establishing a global reputation as one of Chantilly’s up-and-coming resident Englishmen.

He returned with his oft-travelled star a year later and repeated the feat. Then, in 2013, came the Pan Sutong-owned Akeed Mofeed’s Hong Kong Cup triumph, a little more than two years after Gibson had relocated to Sha Tin.

And that undercard treble in 2014 was made up of Dundonnell in the 1400m Class 1 handicap, Got Fly in the 1800m Class 3 and the debutant Giant Treasure in the 1400m Class 3. Giant Treasure returned one year on to split two champions in the 2015 Hong Kong Mile, Japan’s Maurice and Hong Kong’s highest-rated horse of all-time, Able Friend. 

“He’s as talented as I’ve ever trained but he doesn’t …

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