By Joe Bianca
The pride of New Mexico, GIII Sunland Derby winner Runaway Ghost (Ghostzapper), suffered a hairline fracture to his shin in a workout Saturday and will miss his intended start in the GI Kentucky Derby, Joe Peacock, Jr., son of the colt's owner, confirmed to TDN Sunday. The Todd Fincher trainee will not require surgery and will be turned out to recuperate. The story was originally reported by Blood-Horse.
“Obviously we're very disappointed,” Peacock said. “We're very high on the colt. He's our first baby out of our prized mare [Rose's Desert] that had a fantastic career and we were very hopeful that he was going to have a legitimate Run for the Roses. Unfortunately that didn't work. He had a workout yesterday and when he got back and they were cooling him out, thankfully our trainer realized something wasn't quite right. He had some soreness, we did an x-ray and found a hairline fracture that's not a big deal, but the right thing to do is to give him some time off. The timing of it is unfortunate, but it's the right thing to do for 'Ghost,' so that's what we're doing.”
Prior to his Sunland Derby heroics, Runaway Ghost captured the Golden Nugget S. at Golden Gate and the Riley Allison S. at Sunland, and was second in the Mine That Bird Derby.
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