Trainer Art Sherman has launched a broadside at owner Steve Coburn after it was announced America’s Horse of the Year, California Chrome, would continue his racing career next year.
Coburn was a minority shareholder to Perry Martin as owners of the big chestnut, who last raced when second in the Dubai World Cup at Meydan in March.
Coburn’s 30 per cent share was bought out by Taylor Made Stallions last week and last season’s Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes winner is convalescing from a bruised cannon bone at Taylor Made’s farm in Kentucky.
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He will remain there for about 80 days before returning to Sherman’s Los Alamitos base in California ahead of a campaign as a five year old.
“I think it will be the best for the horse and for everybody concerned that we are finally with a group of people that have had horses and have been in the game for such a long time,” Sherman said. “Things happen for the best.”
California Chrome was to run in the Prince Of Wales’s Stakes at Royal Ascot last month before he sustained a stone bruise on the gallops at Newmarket when he was being looked after by trainer Rae Guest.
He was being prepared for a tilt at next month’s Arlington Million, a race in which Sherman has said the chestnut colt was in no condition to run before the discovery of his injury.
“I was getting ready to talk them out of it,” Sherman said. “There was no way that horse was tight enough to go a mile and a quarter to go on the grass. He needed building up and it is the best thing that could have happened.
“He lost a lot of weight, he needs to put on 100 to 150 pounds (48-68 kilograms).
“I think there would have been disappointment. They had plans and I can understand that – owner Perry Martin is from Chicago (where the race is held). It would have been very difficult for Chrome to even make that race.
“I would not have run him. It makes everybody look like they don’t know what they are doing.
“It [the injury] was probably a blessing in disguise right now. It will finally give this horse a chance at R&R and will let him be a horse.”
Sherman will make racing plans with Duncan Taylor, chief executive of Taylor Made Stallions where California Chrome is expected to stand at stud at the end of his racing career.
Coburn’s departure from the scene brings to an end a colourful association with California Chrome. Coburn bred the horse in tandem with Martin and notoriously branded his rival owners as cowardly when California Chrome failed to land the Triple Crown last year in the Belmont Stakes.
Although there were rumours of disharmony between Martin and Coburn, a schism appeared when Sherman and Coburn persuaded Martin that it was the right thing to do to run against Shared Belief in the San Antonio Stakes in February.
After the announcement to run at Royal Ascot, Martin delivered a statement revealing the reasons why California Chrome was set to run at Royal Ascot and that, “this time I’ve got Chrome’s back”.
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