Lazy Griff suffers suspected tendon injury at Chester

Lazy Griff’s career appears to be in the balance after being pulled up in Saturday’s Virgin Bet Chester Stakes.

Placed in the Derby at Epsom and the Irish Derby last summer, Charlie Johnston’s colt missed the second half of his three-year-old campaign after suffering a season-ending knee injury.

He made a promising return from 11 months off the track when third in Sandown’s Henry II Stakes in May, and got back on the winning trail with an all-the-way victory in the Coral Marathon back at the Esher track in early July.

However, the Middleham Park Racing-owned entire was tailed off when stepped up in class for last month’s Goodwood Cup and while he had significantly less on his plate at Listed level on the Roodee, he was struggling heading out onto the second circuit and was later pulled up quickly by Callum Shepherd.

Middleham Park’s managing director, Tim Palin, told the Press Association “He walked into the horse ambulance and it looks like it’s a tendon injury, but we’ll assess everything properly on Monday morning.

“He’ll have lots of TLC between now and then. It looks like a tendon injury, but we don’t think it’s life threatening.

“The issue last year was with his knee – it was skeletal last time and this is the tendon, so it’s a different thing.

“It’s sod’s law as we’ve been crying out for softer ground and the first time he gets it, this unfortunately reared its ugly head, but that’s horse racing.”

He added: “He was a €75,000 yearling, won a Group Three at two and was placed in two Derbys – if the music had stopped at any point of this CV, you’d have regarded him as a success story.

“He came back after his injury and won the Marathon at Sandown and he’s been a pleasure to have anything to do with.”

Palin added: “He’s achieved far more than most horses do in their lifetime. He’s not definitely retired. We’ll just see what the vet says on Monday and go from there.”