Jockey Michael Dee comforts Gingernuts as the Kiwi star broke down behind the stalls before the A$2m Emirates Stakes at Flemington. Photo / AAP
Jockey Michael Dee comforts Gingernuts as the Kiwi star broke down behind the stalls before the A$2m Emirates Stakes at Flemington. Photo / AAP
Scans in Melbourne this morning will decide whether Gingernuts could one day become a racehorse again or that his dynamic career is over.
The New Zealand high flyer fractured a pastern in his near-side foreleg cantering to the barriers minutes before the start of Saturday's A$2m Emirates Stakes at Flemington.
Veterinarians would not allow Gingernuts to be walked from the spot rider Michael Dee pulled him up at close to the 2000m starting point and after heavily bandaging the leg he was assisted on to the horse ambulance and transferred to the Wirribee Veterinary Hospital.
"We were there not much more than half an hour after he was loaded on to the ambulance," co-trainer Stephen Autridge told the Herald yesterday.
The pastern connects the fetlock joint to the foot. If the scans reveal the fracture is vertical and also not the full length of the bone, it will be pinned and there would be a realistic chance Gingernuts could recover sufficiently well to return to the track following a lengthy spell.
The pastern is similar to the cannon bone that connects the knee to the fetlock. If that cracks vertically it can also be successfully pinned.
McGinty is a fine example how successful that can be. He cracked a cannon bone winning his lead-up to Sydney's Golden Slipper can came back to win group one races.
If either bone fractures across it is much more of a major and is generally unable to be successfully reconnected.
"He's fine within himself," says Autridge. "There is no suggestion his problem is life-threatening."
Gingernuts, looking a picture in the birdcage, cantered to the start to the immense satisfaction of Autridge, closely watching from the birdcage, "I thought he cantered away the best I've seen him."
I heard the bone crack.
Less than a minute later his career was in tatters. "I heard the bone crack," said Dee. Live coverage showed the spot where it happened.
"One stride he was fine then he faltered," said Autridge.
As television commentator Richard Freedman, himself again a trainer, said: "What a great thing Gingernuts didn't make it into the barriers and start the race. The damage at full speed would have been much worse."
The Emirates and the A$1m Darley, run 45 minutes previously and won by Redzel, highlights the highs and lows of racing at the top level.
Redzel's large syndicate of owners revelled in his $12 million Everest victory and went just as crazy in their red gear as their powerhouse sprinter prove he was Australia's best. One part owner, who has battled back from life-threatening cancer and all manner of ills, calls Redzel, "Dr Red".
"He's kept me alive," he says.
A further example is win by the Autridge, Jamie Richards-trained Embellish in the $500,000 Al Basti Equiworld Guineas at Riccarton: celebrations were only just under way in Christchurchonly when the Gingernuts catastrophe unfolded in Melbourne.
Sydney trainer Pat Webster, one of racing's gentleman, watched his horse Happy Clapper run the first half of the 2000m Emirates, then swung away from the live television coverage in the Flemington owners room to provide first aid to one of Gingernut's syndicate owners who had collapsed.
"It looked serious and I was trying to help him and didn't even know Happy Clapper had finished second," Webster said.
It was later discovered the Gingernuts owner had fainted, probably from the shock of the horse being injured and withdrawn.
The Victoria Racing Club issued a release late on Saturday night to say the owner had recovered and would not need to be hospitalised.
Autridge could not say enough about the help the VRC had provided the team. "They even sent a limo out to the Werribee clinic to pick us up late to drive us back to town and to our hotels."
