Horse of a lifetime Pyledriver, who won £2m, retired after training setback
One of the most popular horses on the Flat, Pyledriver, has been retired from racing.
Co-trainer William Muir announced on Tuesday that the recurrence of a ligament injury has led connections to call time on his outstanding career.
It was the latest of a number of training setbacks to have dogged the career of the six-year-old.
Despite those interruptions he managed to deliver Muir and partner Chris Grassick their first G1 success when he won the Coronation Cup in 2021.
The following year he added the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes at Ascot. He won twice at Royal Ascot, capturing the Hardwicke Stakes and had total earnings of £2 million.
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He was being prepared for Saturday’s September Stakes at Kempton, ahead of a tilt at the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe.
“He worked on Saturday and to be honest he was sensational,” said Muir. “He’s never a horse we’ve galloped off the bridle and done anything stupid with, but it was just the way he did it, the way he moved, the way he looked and he marched off the gallops like a lion.
“I actually said to the owners ‘you’ve just seen your next winner’ and he was fine 90 per cent of the way home, but when he got back to the yard he was just a little bit sore in the same place we first got the suspensory injury before.
“I called my vet and he said he’d just tweaked it and had a bit of inflammation around it and he was really sore to touch it, but like Pyledriver does on Sunday morning he was 100 per cent sound and bucking and kicking.
P J McDonald after winning on Pyledriver (Getty Images for Ascot Racecours)“We had him on the walker on Sunday and cantered him on Monday and the vet came back and looked at him and couldn’t believe it.
“We could run him on Saturday and he might win, but the horse has done so much for us and I just feel if I ran him and he tweaked it there’s a good chance he could do some damage, or like all of us if you’ve got a little niggle somewhere do you put more weight somewhere else and cause a problem?
He went on: “This horse has been fantastic to all of us, to the owners, to me, to the yard and to the jockeys that have ridden him and he doesn’t deserve anything to go wrong, so I think it’s the right time.
“He’s been a fantastic servant, but it isn’t just him. I’d be the same if this was a small-time runner at Southwell on a Saturday night. It’s just the case that I’m in this game because I love animals, I’ve worked with horses all my life and we’ve got to do what’s right.”
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