Sir Gino pulled up with suspected pelvic injury in International Hurdle

On an afternoon when Britain’s National Hunt fans had expected to be looking for potential winners at the festival meeting in March, they left here hoping instead for positive news on Nicky Henderson’s Sir Gino. The most exciting prospect in the sport was pulled up with a suspected pelvic injury in the International Hurdle.

Sir Gino went into Saturday’s Grade Two contest as the clear favourite for the Champion Hurdle in March, having gone unbeaten in seven starts including a brilliant novice chase win at Kempton in December 2024. He was held up last of the four runners as Nemean Lion cut out the running and pulled up by Nico de Boinville shortly after jumping the third-last flight.

“They were able to put him into the ambulance,” Henderson said. “It’s his right-hind, and it appears to be high up, so there’s no lower limb fracture. It would appear to be a pelvic injury.

“He has loaded and I’d rather they take him to Three Counties veterinary hospital [in Tewkesbury] without unloading here. Then they can assess and scan and just see where we are.

“Pelvic injuries can be little or big, so we’ve just got to keep everything crossed. We won’t know any more tonight. They need a chance to assess him so it will be late on, I expect.”

The New Lion, the second-favourite for Saturday’s race and the Champion Hurdle beforehand, stayed on well up the hill to beat Nemean Lion by a length and a half, but he returned to a subdued winner’s enclosure as fans waited for news about Sir Gino.

“I’m a big fan of this sport,” said Dan Skelton, The New Lion’s trainer. “ Sir Gino could be the best horse in training and we just didn’t need that. The team at Seven Barrows have been through hell and back to get him back on track and hopefully he is OK.”

Nicky Henderson, Sir Gino’s trainer, said: ‘We’ve just got to keep everything crossed.’ Photograph: Steven Paston/PA

The New Lion was cut to around 5-2 for the Champion Hurdle after his win and Skelton said: “We needed to get a clear round after [falling in the Fighting Fifth Hurdle at] Newcastle and Harry [Skelton, The New Lion’s jockey] did exactly what I wanted him to do and held him into the bottom of all the jumps.

“The unanswered question with this horse is the speed angle and he showed a lot of speed at Newcastle despite ending up on the floor. He showed a lot of speed there as well from turning in to the last, and then from the last to the line.”

Skelton, the clear leader in the race for the 2025-26 National Hunt trainers’ championship, had seen his main Gold Cup prospect, Grey Dawning, finish third of the four runners behind Spillane’s Tower in the Grade Two Cotswold Chase.

Jack Kennedy was aboard Spillane’s Tower for the first time since Jimmy Mangan’s gelding split Fact To File and Galopin Des Champs in a memorable running of the John Durkan Memorial Chase in 2024. He oozed confidence throughout on the eight-year-old before quickening past L’Homme Presse on the run up the hill.

This was a significant and impressive return to form for Spillane’s Tower after two lacklustre runs over hurdles this season. He was cut from 50-1 to 10-1 for the Cheltenham Gold Cup by Paddy Power, in a market still looking for a clear favourite.

“It’s my first [winner in Britain] since Monty’s Pass [in the 2003 Grand National],” Mangan said. “I would have gone back to Ireland a disappointed man if he had put up a poor show today. I suppose you do have to start dreaming of the Gold Cup and he’s in that grade now.”

The Trials Day card concluded in near-darkness when the final race was delayed for about 30 minutes after the discovery of a hole in the turf, prompting an inspection and a reconfiguration of the course. Henderson withdrew the likely favourite, Act Of Innocence, and the result – a narrow win for Kripticjim over Taurus Bay, in the colours of Harry Redknapp – was announced after prolonged examination of a photo-finish image taken in the very last of the light.

Interviewed by Lydia Hislop on Racing TV, the clerk of the course Jon Pullin said: “It was a single hole, there weren’t any other holes. It was about a foot deep, there’s a gap underneath it, we moved off the area, checked the area we were due to race on and all participants were happy to carry on.

“It could be [a drainage hole], it’s too early to say at this stage. We need to do further work to understand exactly what has caused it. We were mindful (of the sunset), but that wasn’t a consideration until we had made the decision to carry on, after that we assessed what light we had left.”

Pullin was shown a print of the final-race finish and conceded it was “not ideal”. He added: “We need time to understand what has caused this incident and that is what we will start with straight away.”