Champion gelding Nerodio has been put down after falling in the closing stages of Saturday’s feature race Beaufine Stakes at Belmont in Perth on Saturday.
Nerodio, the two-time winner of the $125,000 race, fell at around the 150m mark when challenging eventual winner Puli.
Jockey Jarrad Noske was able to walk away from the incident, but Nerodio’s injuries were deemed “catastrophic”, according to Perth Racing.
Know the news with the 7NEWS app: Download today
“In today’s feature event, the Beaufine Stakes, NERODIO, ridden by JJ Noske, fell at around the 150m mark, when challenging to win the race,” they said in a statement.
“The horse was immediately attended to by veterinary staff, but unfortunately his injuries were deemed catastrophic.
“JJ Noske thankfully suffered no major injury.
“NERODIO was a fan favourite and a flagbearer for Stephanie Bakranich’s stable, having won 11 races – all of them at Belmont – from 38 starts, including two previous editions of the Beaufine Stakes itself.
“Our thoughts are with all of those connected to NERODIO.”
The tragedy took the gloss of what was a brilliant victory for Puli.
Puli, who was slammed by punters late in betting from $26 down to $12, scorched across to lead from gate five with Nerodio ($12) covering the move into second place and receiving a lovely slipstream.
Man Crush ($3.70), while settling third, couldn’t compete with the lightning pace set up front and Minsk Moment ($3.90) was well back in proceedings.
At the 300m, Nerodio moved up to take Puli and looked destined to win the race with the rest failing to land any telling blows.
When Nerodio departed the race with 100m left, Puli was left clear and went home to salute by more than two lengths from Man Crush.
Given the virtually unheralded scenes, onlookers were left speechless and rivals riders turned their attentions to the fan favourite who could not be saved.
Winning trainer Meryl Hayley was left heartbroken by the tragedy.
“It’s absolutely devastating, to be honest,” Hayley said.
“It’s not the way you want to win a race – my horse was probably going to run second and after Nerodio fell, I actually stopped watching Puli.
“I’m super proud and obviously Lucky (Laqdar Ramoly) rode him a treat.
“Like I said, under normal circumstances, it would’ve been amazing.
“I’m actually quite good friends with Stephanie, so I’m feeling for her.
“He’d gone sailing past us and had it in the bag.”
– With The West