Racing: Grylls rejects Melbourne offer

Craig Grylls can't hide his delight as Pasta Post wins last year's City of Auckland Cup. The gelding is back in work for a spring campaign. Photo / Greg Bowker

Craig Grylls is no longer going to ride in Melbourne.

The highly successful New Zealand apprentice decided yesterday to remain in New Zealand.

Grylls was offered the position as No 2 stable rider for the Moroney team in Melbourne alongside Glen Boss.

The offer was made during a six-week working holiday at the Queensland winter carnival and when he returned home two weeks ago he decided to take up the offer.

"But the more I've thought about it this last week the more I realise what I'll be missing here if it doesn't work as well as hoped," he said.

One of the big attractions is Pasta Post, who is back in work with Grylls' boss Graeme Sanders after unsoundness problems.

Grylls won the Easter Handicap on Pasta Post before the problems struck.

"He's only been swimming, but so far his legs look very good.

"I'd have hated being in Australia and have to watch him win a race like the Kelt Capital with someone else on his back."

Grylls rode work for a number of trainers during his Brisbane stay, including Bart Cummings and the veteran master was impressed.

"Come to Melbourne and ride work for me and I'll put you on some of them raceday," Cummings told the New Zealander.

Grylls has been riding work and managing many of the raceday tasks for the Moroney team this side of the Tasman at Matamata.

"I'll still be on the team here in New Zealand as well as the good horses like Kaaptan," he said.

Grylls won the group one Ford Diamond Stakes at Ellerslie on the Stephen McKee-trained Kaaptan.

"I think I can have a very good season in New Zealand."

Grylls finishes his apprenticeship in March next year.

* * *

You need some luck to win a Melbourne Cup.

English stayer Bauer, beaten a lip in last year's Cup and set for this year's edition, has broken down and will be missing this spring.

Bauer, part-owned by former Australian test cricketer Simon O'Donnell, looked certain to win last year until the rock-hard fitness put into Viewed by Bart Cummings held him at bay by a penciline.

The six-year-old suffered a tendon injury in his work at home for leading English trainer Luca Cumani.

"He will be out until next year. It's rather sad because we were looking forward to taking him back to Melbourne," Cumani told the Racing Post.

"Everybody in the yard is gutted. He will have some treatment and rest and hopefully he'll make it back next year."

In the aftermath to last year's Cup, it was found that Bauer had posted a time one-hundredth of a second faster than Viewed.

The discrepancy was explained by the fact that the speed sensing equipment in the saddle of the smaller Bauer crossed the line before that in Viewed's saddle, despite the fact that he went down by a nose.

* * *

New South Wales racing authorities are breathing easier after reports of an international racehorse testing positive to the equine influenza virus in Sydney were found to be inaccurate.

The test result on the horse was termed "ambiguous", but the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry says it is not the same as a positive test.

"Some horses that recently arrived at Eastern Creek [Quarantine Station] from the UK and the US had developed signs of a respiratory infection but testing to date indicates it is not EI," the department said.

The horses had tested positive to equine herpes virus 4, which causes a mild respiratory disease similar to a common cold.

"Equine herpes virus 4 is already present in Australia and most other countries, and is not a disease of quarantine concern."

Following the 2007 equine influenza outbreak, stronger biosecurity measures had been put in place.

The horses will be held in quarantine until the tests confirm they are free of EI.

- additional reporting AAP