Grand National pursuit

Equestrian sports are attracting growing attention among Chinese.[Photo provided to China Daily]

"It was too much higher than other race meetings at that time," he says, smiling.

The bright prospects for Chinese thoroughbred owners are about far more than prize money. His club's members can share and own the world's top stallions.

"China has many billionaires buying tourist sites or chateaus overseas. But buying stallions is to sow seeds, to harvest in the future."

He has a dream that China will have the world's largest number of stallions in five years.

Last year, Teo's club became the first Chinese equine club sending racehorses with Chinese ID cards overseas. Previous winners of the China Equine Cultural Festival－Beat of the Drum, The Ferryman and Alcott－were exported to the United States and now race in California.

"I meet people (in China) with the necessary interest, passion and enthusiasm to drive the industry to become an integral part of Chinese sporting culture," says Tom Magnie of Coolmore Australia, the world's leading thoroughbred breeder.

"I feel that it (the China Equine Cultural Festival) is a must-see spectacle for the people of China."

Lack of an internationally recognized quarantined area for equestrian disease in the mainland, an old problem for the Chinese horse industry, has recently been partially solved. Shanghai established two temporary quarantine districts, to which Chinese horses will be sent before they go overseas.