24 hours after the announcement of Face Time Bourbon's withdrawal from the G1 Prix d'Amérique Legend Race (2700m), his trainer Sebastien Guarato answered our questions. The trainer will now only feature Billie de Montfort in the world's greatest trotting race which will see his former champion Bold Eagle lead the field onto the track for the big event. But Face Time Bourbon, forced into retirement, will leave a great void.
Today is Tuesday, January 25. As tension mounts for the Grand Prix d'Amérique, Sébastien Guarato posts a video on Twitter. Face Time Bourbon, dual Grand Prix d'Amérique winner and favourite for a third title, is announced as a withdrawal:
"I worked Face Time last week and he wasn't very flexible afterwards, which can happen. After his exercise, on Tuesday afternoon, he was still limping, and we immediately sent him to the Cirale state-of-the-art imaging center in Normandy. The verdict is in. The degenerative disease from which he suffers has worsened. We couldn't continue. Of course, there was the possibility of treating and trying to run him again in six months, but it was a risk for him and for the safety of the other horses if something happens during racing. We take no risks.
He was born with a ligament that runs over the navicular bone. And as the bone is damaged by friction, the ligament inflames and the horse limps. If the ligament were to give way, it would be a disaster. He had already had problems just after his qualification, but we had done everything to preserve him given his quality".
Like Bold Eagle, it is again a physical problem that leads a Sébastien Guarato champion to retirement. This trainer who knows how to age horses so well has succeeded in prolonging the careers of these fragile horses to make them champions.
"If he didn't have had that problem, I think Face Time Bourbon could have gone unbeaten all his career. His class meant that, even if sometimes he had to be in pain, he took it upon himself or he ran a little less well. I also think that's what gave him so much speed on left-hand tracks because he felt less of that discomfort. He had transformed a handicap into the quality of his racing.
Although I knew that his career would not be for ten years, I saw during his last trip to Naples that the date of his retirement was approaching. I know my horse too well not to observe the slightest change.
What is reassuring is that he can still put his foot down and walk. We will keep him indoors for a while and he will commence his breeding season in February. But his racing career is over."
Face Time Bourbon has an incredible record: 43 races for 35 victories and 8 second places, 17 Group 1's and earnings approaching 3.4 million euros.
"He is a great champion. He was only 1st or 2nd. I'm disappointed and it's a real blow. It's part of the game when you're a trainer, but I think I was fortunate to the chance to train him, and horses like Bold Eagle and Rapide Lebel. Face Time Bourbon is a horse of great kindness, very courageous, very tough, a real fighter in the race. He was simply so gifted."
End the winter in style with the "granny" Billie de Montfort
She's the Iron Lady. She ran in the first two-year-old races of her magical "B" generation and is still there at eleven years old. Winner of the very first Group 1 against her peers, she then had to bow, sometimes narrowly, to Bold Eagle, Bird Parker and other great horses of that generation, but she is an incredible champion who will run her sixth G1 Grand Prix d'Amérique (2700m).
"Billie de Montfort is doing very well. She ran 3rd in the Prix de Bourgogne, she could even have been 2nd. For the Prix d'Amérique, it's harder over 2700m. With a good race along the rail, we are looking for a 7th place. We remain modest. She has the freshness in her, and she gives her all every time.
She is 11 years old and has run more than 100 times and won more than 2 million euros, winning the Criterium des Jeunes at 3 years old and still winning Group race in Italy later in life. She will run the Prix de France and the Criterium de Vitesse before becoming a broodmare. She has been in the stables for more than eight years and was both Bold and Face Time Bourbons' companion.
Her strength was her ease in her ability to trot. She has never needed to see the vet, she lives outside in a paddock and only goes out harnessed twice a week. She lives with a friend outside and that's enough for her".
Bold Eagle's return to Vincennes
Bold Eagle will lead the Grand Prix d'Amérique parade. "It's a way to say goodbye to Vincennes because we couldn't do it properly. I hope we can put Face Time Bourbon by his side next year. The horse will be harnessed again, a first for a year. He might be a little fresh and jumpy. He won 21 Group 1 races for us and it is a genuine pleasure to be able have him again with us".
