What's next for Nature Strip?
Nature Strip went under in last Saturday’s Group 1 Lightning Stakes, puncturing at the 200m mark in a run that isn’t foreign to punters who have followed him in his 41 race starts.
Superstar trainer Chris Waller spoke to the media straight after the race, saying he’s not ready to write off his super sprinter, indicating the eight-year-old will press-on in his autumn campaign.
Wayne Hawkes, who has trained some of the best gallopers in recent memory, says if Nature Strip was under his care, he’d retire him.
“I’d retire him, I think he’s done what he needs to,” Hawkes told SENTrack’s Giddy Up with Gareth Hall.
“Is he a man of better years? Probably. Tony Santic stood there after Makybe Diva’s third Melbourne Cup and said ‘that’s it, sayonara, see you later’.
“Joel Selwood, he stood there and said, ‘thank you, I’m done’. There comes a time where the end is the end and no one wants to see Nature Strip gone because he’s a crowd puller and we all love him.
“He’s a great, great horse, he’s going to be remembered with the Schillaci’s, Black Caviar’s, Chatauqua, Placid Ark, Special, he’s going to be remembered as good as them and I’ve got goosebumps right now and he’s not even my horse.
“Would I go on with him? No, I wouldn’t. I would say enough is enough, I’d keep him in work and parade him on Newmarket day and then go to Sydney and parade him on TJ Smith day to say farewell and give him a good break.
“That’s easy for someone else to say but it’s no different to the end of the AFL season and we look at a team and say ‘Dustin Martin it too old or Trent Cotchin is this and he should retire’.
“This is the thing that we have every single year and it’s no different to any athlete, and Nature Strip is an athlete, that when you get to the point where you say ‘when is he not going to win’?
“It’s not going to hurt him to run again but the bottom line is, where do you want to stop with him and say enough is enough and that’s the question.”
Nature Strip is expected to run in next month’s TJ Smith Stakes, and he’s still holding equal favouritism with Sportsbet in the 1200m Group 1 feature.