KEY POINTS:
New Zealand Cup hero Flashing Red has left his Canterbury trainers and may never race here again.
In a shock move, trainers Tim Butt and Phil Anderson will not prepare the veteran warhorse for next month's Victoria Cup.
And that means his chance of racing in this country again are minimal.
Senior training partner Butt revealed yesterday he did not want the 10-year-old, who paced a national record winning last Tuesday's $750,000 New Zealand Cup, to race in Victoria next month.
So he handed him back to former trainer Stu Hunter.
Flashing Red will leave New Zealand today and is unlikely to return.
The other suitable race remaining for him this season is the Auckland Cup but with travel restrictions caused by equine influenza, he would not be able to come back to Auckland to defend his title in that race because he will be contesting the Interdominions a week earlier.
And next season he will be 11 and will surely be retired to stud.
Hunter and co-owner Norm Jenkins want Flashing Red to race in the Victoria Cup next month but Butt said he would rather give the stallion some beach training and set him for the longer, more suitable Hunter Cup in February.
"They said we might get him back to train up in Australia after New Year for the Hunter Cup but I think he should have stayed here to get ready.
"But I am not going to argue with them, I feel lucky to have had him for this time because he is a great, great stayer. But I am a bit disappointed."
Flashing Red was a battling journeyman on the Australian Grand Circuit until Butt and Anderson transformed him last season.
They won the New Zealand and Auckland Cups with him before Hunter trained him during a largely fruitless Australian campaign.
He had battled this season until a radical change in his training regime resulted in his astounding return to form last Tuesday.
Butt will still head to Melbourne later in the summer with Cup third placegetter Tribute and Foreal.
"They will race here this Friday then come up to Auckland and eventually we will go to Melbourne."
Also coming north is Mountbatten, who set up a national 2600m record when third last Friday.
* Changeover will have a spell and could contest the Auckland Cup in March but is more likely to stick to 4-year-old racing.
Stablemates Monkey King and Baileys Dream will race in the Manukau and Franklin Cups next month before the Auckland Cup.
Seeing red
* Flashing Red will leave New Zealand today and be trained in Australia.
* Tim Butt, who trained him to win last Tuesday's New Zealand Cup, wanted the veteran to stay here until January.
* His former trainer, Stu Hunter, will prepare Flashing Red for the Victoria Cup.
