Awesome Maria sidelined with foreleg fracture
July 21, 2011SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. (AP) - Star filly Awesome Maria is out for at least the rest of the year with a leg injury.
Trainer Todd Pletcher says the 4-year-old has a fractured left foreleg but has a promising chance to fully recover and race in 2012.
Awesome Maria has won four straight graded stakes and is among the season's leading older female thoroughbreds.
She was to have made her next start July 31 in the Ruffian Invitational Handicap at Saratoga Race Course. Pletcher says the injury was detected after a 5-furlong breeze at Saratoga on Monday. She was shipped to Rood and Riddle Equine Hospital in Kentucky and underwent surgery Wednesday.
Awesome Maria is 7-3-1 in 12 starts, with more than $840,000 in earnings.