Ortensia will be shipped back to Australia after suffering an injury during
Saturday’s Group 1 Haydock Sprint Cup. After beating only one rival in the
six-furlong contest, the Group 1 Nunthorpe heroine was found to have
over-reached and her European campaign is now at an end.
“She’s a bit tender,” trainer Paul Messara told PA Sport Sunday. “She
sustained a pretty good splicing at the back of her fetlock in the race. I’m not
sure exactly at what stage of the race she did it, but she got a good one-inch
cut right at the back of the fetlock right over the sesamoid, so it would have
been quite painful for her to run on it.
“She did it early in the race and has done it a few times because she
actually cut through the bandage. We had both fetlocks bandaged and still
managed to put an inch splice in it. We’re not sure if she did it jumping out of
the stalls in the first few strides or at another stage.
“It certainly is sore enough and a big enough cut for her not to stretch out
as we would have had expected her to over the final two furlongs. Luckily, I
don’t think it’s going to be a long-term thing. Hopefully after a couple of
weeks to heal up, the bruising will go away she will be OK.
“She’s still in Newmarket at the moment, but she will probably go into
quarantine this week and get home. It was just disappointing we couldn’t put the
icing on the cake on Saturday, but unfortunately that’s racing.
“She certainly had a fair excuse after she pulled up and we got a chance to
see what the full story was.”
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