Leading Irish chaser Flemenstar look’s set to miss next months Cheltenham Festival, after trainer Peter Casey confirmed the horse was suffering from a lung infection.
The eight year old finished second to Sir Des Champs in Sunday’s Hennessy Gold Cup at Leopardstown, and initially connections were disappointed with the effort. However, following examinations on Monday the problem was discovered, and Casey now admits a trip to the festival is “very unlikely”. It appears as if Aintree will be next on the agenda following a couple of week’s on the sidelines.
Casey said: “He’ll be out for two to three weeks. It’s a bad lung infection. The vets found he had it today. He’s going to be all right in the long term, but I would say Cheltenham is very unlikely now. The jockey (Andrew Lynch) thought something was wrong on Saturday and it looks like he was right. We’ll probably look at Aintree now.”
Flemenstar holds entries at Cheltenham in the Betfred Gold Cup, the Ryanair Chase and the sportingbet.com Queen Mother Champion Chase. However, it seems that he may now wait for Liverpool, and the big Punchestown festival in the Spring.
