Injury blow curtails season for sprinting ace Venetian Sun

Karl Burke’s star sprinter Venetian Sun has been hit with an injury that will rule her out for the rest of the season.

One of last year’s leading juveniles, the speedy daughter of Starman – who is owned by Brighton & Hove Albion’s Tony Bloom alongside Ian McAleavy – has continued to excel this term, winning for a second time at Royal Ascot when scorching to Commonwealth Cup gold.

She was last seen finishing a fine second to her elders at Newmarket in the July Cup and held the option of heading to France for this weekend’s Prix Maurice de Gheest at Deauville, where she won the Prix Morny at two.

However, plans for the rest of her three-year-old season have now had to be put on hold after the discovery of a tendon issue.

Burke told the Press Association: “It’s a big shame and unfortunately it happens. It’s a long way from being a career- or life-threatening injury, but obviously is going to take time and it’s very disappointing.

“We had more or less decided to swerve Deauville anyway because the ground was very fast out there last weekend with no sign of any rain and the French not watering like they used to do.

“It’s just one of those things, we have a feeling she may have initiated it at Newmarket during the July Cup but she came back from there with a nasty little cut and she had been on antibiotics and anti-inflammatories and we think that may have masked it to a degree.”

Venetian Sun has won six of her nine career outings to date, with her team excited for an autumn campaign which could have seen her compete in Haydock’s Sprint Cup, Ascot on British Champions Day and at the Breeders’ Cup.

Patience will now be the optimum word during what will be a prolonged period on the sidelines.

Explaining the injury, Burke added: “It’s basically a strain to the tendon, it happens a lot with jumping horses – it’s unusual really at this stage in a sprinter’s life, but can happen.

“It’s a time thing now and she will have the next six or seven months on the easy list and then be reassessed from there.

“The little bit of work she has done the last few days has just aggravated it and we’ve had the vets in this morning and they weren’t 100 per cent happy with a little bit of heat in the leg and that is what it turns out to be.”

“The plan before today was if she finished the season in good shape she would stay in training and that may still be the plan, but that is a discussion for later on.”