Champion Weekend Hussler may have run his last race with trainer Ross McDonald forced to put an end to the spring preparations for the four-year-old after he was diagnosed with rare inflammatory condition called synovitis.
Weekend Hussler wrenched in his off foreleg joint when finishing fifth the Australia Stakes (1200m) at Moonee Valley in February and was immediately spelled, but the injury did not heal in the paddock and an arthroscope this week revealed the condition, which could spell the end of a brilliant racing career.
McDonald conceded that Weekend Hussler had only a 60 percent chance of getting back to the track.
"Everyone's disappointed for sure. I think everyone in racing is disappointed but it's one of those things in racing," McDonald said on Wednesday.
"We never made any plans (for the Spring Racing Carnival) because we knew we were working on getting him right, but the Cox Plate would have been on the agenda. There's nothing written on the injury he's got so it's all a bit of a guessing game."
Veterinarian Rob McInnes told Racing Victoria that synovitis, an inflammatory condition, was hard to diagnose.
"You can only diagnose the problem via an arthroscope because nothing shows up on the x-rays, and hence radiographs after his poor performance on 14 February didn't show anything," he said.
"Once he hadn't responded to the normal treatment regimes for a wrenched joint as we diagnosed initially we spelled him, but it (the injury) didn't improve out in the paddock, hence he was brought back into the stables and the arthroscope was put in."
"We flushed it out and we have given him cortisone steroids postoperatively and it hasn't responded so far."
The 2007-2008 Australian Horse of the Year swept all before him as a three-year-old, collecting six Group One wins and captivating the racing public with 12 wins in his first 15 starts.
McDonald set Weekend Hussler for an ambitious crack at the Caulfield Cup, Cox Plate and Melbourne Cup as a four-year-old, but poor form and injuries saw that campaign abandoned after the Caulfield Cup, where he ran 12th.
He returned with a fourth in the Lightning Stakes but it was apparent when he failed to finish off behind Apache Cat in the Australia Stakes that all was not right.
The diagnosis means that at a minimum he will not race until next autumn, depending on how well the four-year-old responds to treatment and rest.