Blow for Russell as injured One For Arthur out for season
National winner suffers minor tendon strain Godolphin pay 4m gns for daughter of Galileo
One For Arthur, last season’s Randox Health Grand National winner and only the second horse trained in Scotland to win the race, is out for the new season after sustaining a tendon injury.
The eight-year-old took his place in Aintree legend for Lucinda Russell when he galloped home strongly from the last fence to beat Cause of Causes by 4½ lengths last April.
As is so often the case with horses that pick up minor tendon strains in action, there was no sign of any damage until he started to do a little more at home on his return to work.
“Ironically we scanned him after the National and again before he started after the summer,” explained Russell’s partner Peter Scudamore, “and nothing showed.
“But when we felt his off-fore after he did a stronger canter on Wednesday there was heat in it. It has only disrupted the fibres and there is no hole in the tendon, but it’s a bit like being a little bit pregnant, he’ll need the season off.
“We’re so grateful for what he did for us and all being well he will be back next year. No yard can afford to lose a horse like One For Arthur, but hopefully we still have a nice team for the winter.”
There were fireworks on the third and final day of Tattersalls’ Book One Yearling Sales yesterday when John Gosden, wearing Godolphin hat, went to 4 million gns to outbid Coolmore for a Galileo filly out of Breeders’ Cup winner Dank. Consigned by James Wigan and already named Gloam, it made her the second-most expensive yearling filly ever sold there.
Although her eventual value as a broodmare will no doubt be what attracted Sheikh Mohammed to her, the underbidders might be consoled by the fact that the only filly to have cost more, Al Naamah, who cost 5m gns, won on her racecourse debut but it was her only win in six starts for Al Shaqab.
Rab Havlin returned from a sixmonth ban imposed by France Galop for failing a drugs test with a winner on Purser at Lingfield. The horse is trained by Gosden, who has stood by Havlin throughout his ordeal.
Havlin said: “I was looking at the day saying there was no pressure, but when I pulled up after the line I thought ‘thank god for that’. It was obviously a bit of a plan to get me to come back on a winner and it’s nice of Frankie [Dettori] to step aside.”
Jockey Graham Gibbons was banned for 2½ years by the British Horseracing Authority disciplinary panel yesterday for testing positive to cocaine and attempting to switch his urine sample for fellow rider Callum Shepherd’s urine. Shepherd faced no charges over the case.