The Asian Mile Challenge is a series of four one-mile (eight furlongs) Thoroughbred horse races. Created in 2005, the series was launched with two races, one in Hong Kong, the other in Japan. In 2006, the Melbourne Racing Club of Australia and the Dubai Racing Club of the United Arab Emirates joined the series.
Raced approxinmately four weeks apart between March and June, a US$1 million bonus is given to any horse who wins two legs of the Asian Mile Challenge. In 2006, the Hong Kong-based horse Bullish Luck collected the bonus after winning the Champions Mile and the Yasuda Kinen.
The Asian Mile Challenge now consists of four Grade I races:
- Futurity Stakes at Caulfield Racecourse, Melbourne
- Dubai Duty Free Stakes at Meydan Racecourse in Dubai
- Champions Mile at Sha Tin Racecourse, Hong Kong
- Yasuda Kinen at Tokyo Racecourse, Tokyo
Famous quotes containing the words asian, mile and/or challenge:
“Morals are in all countries the result of legislation and government; they are not African or Asian or European: they are good or bad.”
—Denis Diderot (1713–1784)
“It was a tangled and perplexing thicket, through which we stumbled and threaded our way, and when we had finished a mile of it, our starting-point seemed far away. We were glad that we had not got to walk to Bangor along the banks of this river, which would be a journey of more than a hundred miles. Think of the denseness of the forest, the fallen trees and rocks, the windings of the river, the streams emptying in, and the frequent swamps to be crossed. It made you shudder.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“People seek a challenge just as fire seeks to flame.”
—Chinese proverb.