NZ HARNESS NEWS
Last season’s top three-year-old trotting filly Show Gait has been retired after going amiss.
A last start winner of a Breeders Crown at Melton in August, giving trainer Regan Todd his first Group One success, Show Gait has a bone fragment in a knee and Todd said “the prognosis was not good”.
“She went sore last Wednesday and we had the knee x-rayed,” said Todd.
“Several different opinions were not promising and the decision was made over the weekend not to risk her any further.
“She’ll have an operation but that’s just so she can be a broodmare.”
Bred by Lindenny Lodge, Show Gait was purchased at the Premier Yearling Sale for $16,000 by Mark Purdon for Natalie Rasmussen’s mother Cheryl.
After being broken in, Show Gait needed an operation to remove a bone chip from a knee and was sent to Todd as an early two-year-old.
“That was nothing major and the problem is with the other knee now, so it may have been a case of off-loading, but you never really know with these things.
“It’s very disappointing because she was looking great and only about a fortnight off the trials.
“I was looking forward to working towards the Jewels.”
Show Gait looked very smart when she won her first two races a year ago and while she lost form for a while, Todd got her back to win the Sales race at Addington over Paramount King and Valloria.
She skipped the Jewels to focus on the Breeders Crown and won both her starts in Victoria, winding up the season with six wins from 12 starts and $113,000 in stakes.
“Things went a bit pear-shaped there for a while after the Southland Trotting Oaks, where she developed a bad hematoma on a bumper.
“That was really bad timing with the NZ Trotting Oaks and Derby right around the corner, but we patched her up to win the Sales race and she’ll always be a special horse for me as my first Group 1 winner.”
Todd was in charge of the ill-fated Kahdon when she won the 2010 Victoria Trotting Oaks for Mark Jones, having just been purchased by Peter Chambers, while he also took Master Lavros to Menangle for the Glenferrie Farm Challenge in 2014.
“Master Lavros went a record in a trial leading up the Challenge but he broke at the start.”
Todd said there had been no thought given yet to a sire for Show Gait, a daughter of Majestic Son who’s closely related to Sundon, but she sits up brilliantly for Love You.
- NZ Harness News
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