07-05-2025
Smart duo join Lim's Elite band
When we hear the word "elite" it is usually referring to something special. Like, top of the class or, the cream of the crop.
Well, on the morning of May 6, the cream certainly rose to the top at the trials run off at the Selangor Turf Club.
Elite Captain took the opener in dominant fashion and Elite Prince followed suit when he stole the show in the second hit-out of the morning.
The wins from the two Elite horses owned by Mahalinggam Palanisamy must have given their trainer Richard Lim a bit of a spring to his step.
The jockey-turned-trainer has endured a rather quiet time of late, having returned empty-handed from his last six race meetings. Boomba was the last winner - and ninth for 2025 - the former Kranji-based trainer led in on April 12.
Lim had three runners involved in two of the four May 6 trials with his third racer - Legend Sixty-Three - taking second to stablemate Elite Prince in Trial No. 2.
The Penang-born conditioner is famous for riding King And King to victory in the Queen Elizabeth II Cup, more notably, thereafter shaking hands with the British monarch, who was at Kranji to witness the race.
Well, that was then. This is now and Lim is slowly but surely making his mark as a trainer.
Back to the trials and Elite Captain and Elite Prince did not just win their trials, they clobbered the opposition into submission.
Elite Captain took the first trial by 3¼ lengths while Elite Prince won by 2½ lengths in the second, but they also ran time. Both of them broke the minute-mark for the 1,000m trip.
The "Captain" clocked an impressive 59.53sec while the "Prince" stopped the clock at 59.79sec.
In the first trial, Elite Captain, who had Uzair Sharudin in the saddle, jumped out from barrier No. 4 in that field of eight, and rather easily found the lead.
After taking a four-length lead from Stop The Water (Laercio de Souza), the son of Brazen Beau opened up in style to win with a leg in the air.
Then in the second, Uzair again found himself being legged up on a winner.
A son of Bon Hoffa, Elite Prince settled in third spot until the 150m mark when he went after the leader, Golden Thirty Six.
Given a flick of the reins and a dig in the ribs, Elite Prince responded and skipped clear to win as he liked. Stablemate Legend Sixty-Three came on like a good horse to claim second spot.
Another horse to turn heads at the trials was Combustion, who, incidentally, was until recently prepared by Lim (in Singapore as well), but has now moved to Lim Shung You's (no relation) yard.
With jockey Lim Shung Uai up and starting from barrier No. 3 on the sand track, the El Roca five-year-old quickly settled into the slipstream of Good Star and Raising Sixty-One, who were one-two at the 600m mark.
Given rein at the furlong marker, he did what his stablemates had done in the earlier trials.
He let rip and gave his rivals no quarters, winning that hit-out by 3½ lengths easing up.
Combustion, whose two career wins in Kranji were over the longer 1,600m and 2,000m, clocked 1min 2.29sec for the trip.
Yes, it was a great day at the office for Lim, even if trial wins do not change stats or bank balances.
What those mock races, however, do is give trainers an insight of what the future may hold, especially for horses who are still relatively unexposed to racing.
In Elite Captain, Lim has a good one in the making.
A one-time winner in Geelong (1,230m) when known as Bracarde, the four-year-old ran fourth on debut in Kuala Lumpur on April 27 and his showing at the trials tells us that he is on the improve.
As for Elite Prince, he is a three-year-old and the trial was his second morning hit-out. He finished runner-up to Kitsune in his first one on turf at Kuala Lumpur on April 8.
That first one was a decent showing and the latest had a bit of that "wow" factor.
If Elite Prince, who arrived as an unraced from Australia, can bring that trial form to the races, he could turn useful for Lim.
brian@
