Dual group 1 winner Press Statement has run his last race and will join the stallion roster at Vinery Stud in the new season.
Retired: Hugh Bowman rides Press Statement to win The CRC Hobartville Stakes. Photo: bradleyphotos.com.au
Vinery's Peter Orton said there had been great interest in the colt and a service fee was likely to be announced on Wednesday.
Trained by Chris Waller to win the J J Atkins at two and this season's Caulfield Guineas, Press Statement won six of his 11 starts and finished fifth in Saturday's All Aged Stakes.
Meantime, Nick Olive will be a relieved trainer on two fronts as he prepares to have his first city runner since his best horse was involved in fall during The Championships.
Advertisement
As Single Gaze crashed to the turf under Kathy O'Hara in the ATC Australian Oaks earlier this month, Olive feared the worst for the horse and rider who a fortnight earlier gave him his first group 1One win.
O'Hara suffered a punctured lung, a broken collar bone and fractured ribs and is expected to be out of racing for up to four months.
It's a similar timeline on Single Gaze's absence from the racetrack, but Olive is glad he will have the chance to train the filly for a spring campaign.
"We've had her in the stable since the fall and she was quite bruised and a bit sorry for herself," Olive said.
"She pulled a muscle in her stomach as well and that will take a couple of months to get right.
"But we had the vet go over her for the last time yesterday and she gave her the go-ahead to go to the (spelling) paddock today." Stablemate Cheeky Devil also has Olive thankful she is heading to Canterbury on Wednesday with her form on the training track pointing to an improvement on an unplaced first-up run in the bush.
"She was probably a touch disappointing the other day but the track was a little bit shifty (at Canberra) and I'm hoping that was her problem," Olive said.
"Her work since then has been great."
Cheeky Devil has won three of her seven starts since joining Olive's Canberra stable at the start of the season.
"She's a handy horse and I definitely think she is up to midweek class on her best form," Olive said.
And Champion sprinter Chautauqua has arrived safely in Hong Kong ahead of his first appearance on the international stage.
The dual TJ Smith Stakes winner travelled with Godolphin's Bow Creek and arrived on Tuesday morning.
Co-trainer Michael Hawkes said the gelding coped well with the trip which took 13-1/2 hours from stable to stable.
"He won't do much between now and Sunday," Hawkes told Melbourne radio station RSN.
"He's travelled well and everything's gone to plan."
Chautauqua, the world's highest-rated sprinter in the latest world rankings, runs in the Chairman's Sprint Prize on Sunday week while Bow Creek will contest the Champion's Mile.
Queensland sprinter Buffering is already in Hong Kong following his triumph in the Al Quoz Sprint in Dubai and will be among Chautauqua's rivals.
AAP