Sea Of Class is in intensive care after a devastating attack of colic that has brought her racing career to an end. The news was broken on Sunday morning by her trainer, William Haggas, who said he was “praying” the filly would survive.
“It is with great regret I have to announce that Sea Of Class underwent a colic operation on Wednesday, which will end her racing career,” Haggas said in a statement issued to the Racing Post. “She is at the vet’s and receiving intensive care and is doing everything as well as can be expected.
“This is obviously devastating news for Mrs Tsui [the horse’s owner] and her family, friends and all of the team here at Somerville Lodge. We are all praying she makes a full and complete recovery to enjoy life as a broodmare. I will update when there is more to say.”
A daughter of Sea The Stars, Sea Of Class burst into the big time last summer with a last-to-first surge in the Irish Oaks. She was widely seen as an unlucky loser in the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe, finishing strongly to be beaten a short neck by Enable after meeting traffic problems as she weaved among her 18 rivals.
Sea Of Class was second-favourite for this year’s Arc, in which her rematch with Enable was already established as the key story for the October contest. The chestnut won £1.5m in her brief career and her value as a broodmare would be hard to calculate.
Haggas said: “If she was a human, you would say she was critical but stable, that’s how it is, there’s nothing more I can add, really. You just have to take each day as it comes.”
The term colic is used to refer to a range of abdominal problems in horses, varying from mild discomfort to a potentially fatal crisis. It has been described as the leading cause of premature death in domesticated horses.
Sea Of Class’s misfortune comes almost exactly a year after the steeplechaser Finian’s Oscar died after surgery for colic. Haggas knows as well as anyone about the dangers of stomach problems in horses. His Derby winner Shaamit was only eight years old when he died from complications after an intestinal haemorrhage.
The bad news about Sea Of Class became one more reason for Enable to shorten at the top of the Arc betting, she impressed in winning the Eclipse on Saturday. Available at 7-2 early the next day, Enable is now no bigger than 13-8 for what would be an unprecedented third triumph in the French race.
Her trainer and jockey, John Gosden and Frankie Dettori, teamed up for another Group One on Sunday, landing Deauville’s Prix Jean Prat with Too Darn Hot. Unbeaten as a juvenile, the colt had become frustrating after defeats in the Dante, the Irish Guineas and at Royal Ascot, but he looked his former classy self in speeding away with the £205,000 prize.
It is legitimate to question the quality of a race in which the placed horses were Space Blues and Fox Champion but connections radiated relief at getting back to the winner’s enclosure with Too Darn Hot, quelling suggestions that he had not trained on. “We’re thrilled with him,” said Gosden, who thought the step down to seven furlongs had been a big help.
“Finally, the trainer and the racing manager have got it right. We’ve done everything badly and the horse has got us out of trouble.”
The rampant Dettori followed up in the next race aboard Joplin, taking his recent score to nine wins from 14 rides over the last week, three of those wins coming in top-class races. But he was lucky to escape a careless riding suspension for an incident in Joplin’s race and might now take a few days off to avoid any risk of a ban that would cause him to miss partnering Enable in the King George on 27 July.
