Glamour three-year-old Pierro will miss the Randwick Guineas and will make his next Sydney autumn carnival appearance against older horses, the Gai Waterhouse stable has confirmed.
“The plan at this stage is not to run in the Guineas and he will be saved for the Canterbury Stakes,” Tulloch Lodge spokesman Mark Newnham told AAP.
Pierro - Photo by Steve Hart
The $350,000 Canterbury Stakes is a weight-for-age race sprint race run over 1300m run at Rosehill on Saturday week.
Waterhouse’s decision to keep Pierro for the Canterbury Stakes sets up a likely clash with the stable’s champion race mare More Joyous.
More Joyous, who worked between races at Warwick Farm on Saturday, has won the past two runnings Canterbury Stakes.
She is earmarked to return in this year’s race, an edition which takes on more significance than in 2011 and 2012 because it has been elevated to Group One status.
Pierro was expected to head along a traditional autumn path for three-year-olds after his tenacious first-up win over Rebel Dane in the Group Two Hobartville Stakes at Rosehill last Saturday week.
In a bid to keep what he thought would be his Guineas ride, jockey Nash Rawiller had an appeal against a five-meeting suspension listed for a hearing on Monday.
If his suspension is overturned, Rawiller could be expected to partner the Waterhouse-trained Proisir in the Randwick Guineas at Warwick Farm on Saturday.
But there is some doubt about the promising galloper taking his place in the $500,000 race, the first leg of an autumn triple crown for three-year-olds.
“Gai will probably make a decision in the next 24 hours about Proisir running,” Newnham said.
Proisir made his autumn return alongside Pierro when he finished third in the Hobartville Stakes.
