2000 Guineas winner Pier sidelined, future uncertain after knee scans

Racehorse Pier, with co-trainer Briar Weatherley, after winning 2000 Guineas at Riccarton in 2023. Photo / Race Images

The career of 2000 Guineas winner Pier hangs in the balance as a knee injury threatens to sideline him just when he looked set to be a spring force.

The Matamata galloper exposed a knee injury when not pleasing trackwork rider Sam Weatherley in a recent track gallop, with scans showing a bone issue.

Trainers Darryn and Briar Weatherley will have further veterinary work done on the five-year-old this week after which the full extent of the issue should be clearer.

“He will be trotted up and have his knee injected with a solution to help but if we find over the next few weeks he is not striding out properly then we have a problem,” says Weatherley.

“We know a lot more after all of that but obviously we wouldn’t continue on with him if we thought the knee was a real issue.”
If the worst-case scenario becomes reality then Pier’s career could come to a crashing halt after just 10 starts that yielded four wins.

He first burst on to the national stage winning the Hawkes Bay Guineas two years ago but his greatest victory came at his next start when he beat subsequent Group 1 stars Desert Lightning and Prowess in the 2000 Guineas.

Pier has raced sparingly since after other physical issues but returned with a fresh up win in June that had him promoted to the head of the markets for last Saturday’s Foxbridge Plate and next week’s Tarzino Trophy, both races he will miss.

The Weatherleys still had plenty to smile about after the Foxbridge as Mali Ston stormed home from near last for second to Bonny Lass.

“He won’t go to the Tarzino, he likes his races spaced so we will save him for the Arrowfield Stud Plate [Sept 28],” said Weatherley.

After a few days to see how their horses recovered from Saturday most of the big players in the Tarzino Trophy are still on target, with the exception of Dragon Leap.

He was struck down by a mysterious soreness after trackwork last Thursday and missed the Foxbridge and there were originally fears he had suffered some sort of fracture.

But all scans and x-rays are clear and the Dragon Leap has pleased the O’Sullivan/Scott stable since so should race again, just not at the Hastings carnival.

Andrew Scott confirmed Waitāk will head to the Tarzino after his booming late run on Saturday while they also intend having last week’s impressive Taupō trialist Grail Seeker there.

“And Geriatrix would even start in the Tarzino too if he gets in the field, but he is a long way down the rankings at the moment,” says Scott.

Co-trainer Graham Richardson confirms Bonny Las is all go for the Tarzino but will not be asked to stretch to the 1600m for the Arrowfield so will return to Rotorua for the Sweynesse Stakes on October 13 after Hastings.

And Tarzino favourite Crocetti remains on track to head to Hastings, with co-trainer Danny Walker saying that is still their plan and Crocetti will be drawn in the field.

“That is where we want to go so he will accept and then if the track is no worse than a Heavy 8 on the Thursday with decent weather forecast we will be all go,” says Walker.

“If it is a Heavy 10 and cloudy then I don’t think we will be there but at this stage, he is going.”

Tarzino Trophy, 7 September, Hastings

(TAB market)

$2.20, Crocetti

$6, Bonny Lass, Skew Wiff.

$10, Mustang Valley, Waitak.

$12, Dragon Leap (not starting)

$16, Malt Time.

$18, Sacred Satono.

$21, Fraglioni, Grail Seeker, Puntura.

Others $26 or more.

Michael Guerin wrote his first nationally published racing articles while still in school and started writing about horse racing and the gambling industry for the Herald as a 20-year-old in 1990. He became the Herald’s Racing Editor in 1995 and covers the world’s biggest horse racing carnivals.