Dual Group 1 winner La Crique has been plagued by foot issues her entire career, and unfortunately they have reared their ugly head once again over the weekend.
The daughter of Vadamos was set to contest the Group 1 Tancred Stakes (2400m) at Rosehill last Saturday, but the race was transferred to Tuesday because of inclement weather, which proved costly to La Crique, who succumbed to a foot infection and was forced to be withdrawn from the rescheduled race.
“When they moved those races to the Tuesday, I was forced to give her a gallop on Sunday,” said Katrina Alexander, who trains in partnership with her husband Simon.
“With the rain that was around, and her feet aren’t the greatest, she has picked up a foot infection with the moisture, and the gallop brought that out.
“Later that afternoon she was a bit foot sore. She is improving all the time, but we just ran out of days to get her right.
“She will come home and we will give her a rest now, there is nothing much there to stay for, especially because we have missed a little bit of work with the foot. We will set our sights to a new campaign.”
Alexander is ruing what could have been, with her stable star in flying form and in-line for another run post the Tancred.
“It is just one of those unfortunate things,” she said.
“If it hadn’t rained we probably would have been right, she would have got through Saturday and she would have had a run to improve from.
“It is just circumstances and with horses it is down to hours and minutes sometimes and we couldn’t get her over the line to get that done.
“She will keep in every other way, she has absolutely thrived on the trip, which has been brilliant to see, and the more she does (travel) the better she gets at it, so that sets us up well for next season.”
It brings an anticlimactic end to a pleasing season for the six-year-old mare, who was victorious in the Group 2 Auckland Thoroughbred Breeders’ Stakes (1400m) at Pukekohe last November before posting four consecutive elite-level runner-up results, including the Group 1 Mufhasa Classic (1600m), Group 1 Zabeel Classic (2000m), Group 1 Herbie Dyke Stakes (2000m), and Group 1 Bonecrusher New Zealand Stakes (2000m).
Meanwhile, Alexander was pleased with the debut runner-up performance of stablemate Rise Companions in the Horizon By SkyCity 1200 at Pukekohe on Wednesday, but said the four-year-old son of Capitalist still has plenty to learn.
“He is a talented horse,” Alexander said.
“He has got a young, green brain in a big, physical body, and he is learning to control his emotions, as we saw today when he was a bit naughty in the barrier, which put him off his game a little bit.
“It is always going to be a bit tricky from the 10 draw and he is not a 1200m horse by any means. I thought it was a brave effort and he will learn a lot from that. He will keep and we will get him up over ground.
“He is probably going forward a 2000m horse, ideally, but you have got to kick-off somewhere and I was relatively pleased with his effort today.”
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