St Nic primed for Autumn return
Last year’s champion juvenile could finish only sixth in the 2000 Guineas and then suffered a setback which forced him to miss the Derby.
“He’s good. Our advice at the time was to give him an easy few days so we decided to give him the month of June off,” said O’Brien.
“We’ll start back slowly then and hopefully we’ll have him back for an autumn campaign. Just when it went a little bit pear-shaped on us we decided not to punish him and just go back slowly to give him all the time he could possibly need.
“We’re looking forward to when he comes back, but I don’t know when that will be.
“We’ll let him tell us day by day but hopefully he’ll have a trial before he goes in one of the big races in the autumn.”
Stablemate Jan Vermeer was sent off favourite at Epsom in St Nicholas Abbey’s absence, but he could only finish fourth behind Workforce. Itlater transpired he lost two shoes during the race.
“He seems to be fine, he came out of the race very well,” O’Brien said.
“I suppose with the benefit of hindsight he was just ready to run at the Curragh and we had in mind to go to the French Derby with him because it is an easier option.
“Obviously when St Nicholas Abbey had the mishap we re-thought everything but it might have come too soon for him. Two weeks might not have been enough time for the improvement to come.
“He lost two shoes but he was perfect after.”
