Trainer Rob Heathcote says he won’t be pressured into retiring his ‘miracle horse’ Rothfire

Trainer Robert Heathote is ignoring suggestions to retire Rothfire and is aiming the Group 1-winning veteran at the Queensland winter carnival.

Trainer Rob Heathcote says he won’t be pressured into retiring his “miracle horse” Rothfire, insisting the old boy still has plenty left in the tank.

Heathcote said the Group 1-winning seven-year-old gelding, who has collected $3.2m in prizemoney, would go around again in this year’s Queensland winter carnival, despite some suggesting it’s time to hang up his saddle.

“It’s funny, a couple of people have said, ‘Has he had enough? Has he finished? Is he going to retire?’ Even the breeder suggested ‘maybe it’s time to retire him’ and I basically said to him in very polite terms ‘piss off’, I’ll decide when I retire him,” Heathcote said.

“We’ll have a crack at the winter carnival. He ran that enormous second in the Stradbroke Handicap two years ago when the (2023) Everest champion (Think About It) beat us.”

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Heathcote doesn’t feel any need to retire Rothfire yet, given the warhorse finished just outside the placings in his last-start at the Magic Millions Buffering over 1400m at Eagle Farm in late December.

“I thought he had a really good (summer) carnival. He raced well,” Heathcote said of the 2020 Group 1 JJ Atkins champion.

“He didn’t have a lot of luck – he had some bad barriers – and his final run when he ran fourth, the track was literally like Nudgee Road in that it was too firm.”

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And it’s sure been a rollercoaster career that could have easily ended in September 2020 when Rothfire suffered a severe sesamoid injury during the running of the Group 1 Golden Rose at a time when he was flying high.

He was due to have a crack at the then $14m The Everest but was forced into a lengthy rehabilitation that had many fearing his racing days were done and dusted.

But Rothfire has an iron will that Heathcote still marvels at, and his stable star returned to the top level in September 2021, competing against superstars such as Imperatriz, Giga Kick and Think About It.

Trainer Robert Heathcote has no immediate plans to send stable star Rothfire into retirement. Picture: Kevin Farmer

Then in April last year, the horse developed a swollen fetlock joint but thankfully he recovered again and made a successful comeback in the $750,000 King Of The Mountain at Toowoomba in January last year which happened to be his last victory.

Heathcote said he had no issue with people questioning whether it was time for Rothfire to retire given the gelding’s injury problems.

“I think it’s fair comment. I’ve made it well known that he’s a bit of a miracle horse,” he said.

“He’s defied veterinary logic to still be racing with the extent of his injury.

“Even the vets, when they vet him for these Group 1 races they say it’s extraordinary because he’s hardly got any flexion in his near foreleg.

“It’s like running with an Adidas shoe on one foot and a gumboot on the other.”

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Heathcote said that just like his superstar gelding Buffering, who retired in 2016 after winning seven Group 1s and more than $7m in prizemoney, he would know when the time was right to send Rothfire to the paddock for a permanent vacation.

“I retired Buffering when he got beaten by a length-and-a-half in the Group 1 Manikato in 2016,” Heathcote recalled.

Trainer Robert Heathcote after Rothfire and jockey Ben Thompson win the King of the Mountain at Clifford Park Racecourse, Monday, January 1, 2024. Picture: Kevin Farmer

“(Jockey) Damian Browne came in and just looked at me and winked as if to say ‘I think that’s enough Rob’.

“We’ll do the same with Rothfire. At this stage he’s still a sound, happy, healthy racehorse.

“The moment I feel he no longer enjoys what he’s doing – either training, trackwork or even racing – then we’ll retire him and give him a good home because he’s been a sensation.

“I shudder to think how good he would’ve been if he hadn’t injured that sesamoid.

“He would’ve been as good as Buffering, I firmly believe that.”

Heathcote said Rothfire would resume in the $300,000 Group 2 Victory Stakes (1200m) on May 3 at Eagle Farm.

Who knows whether this will be his final winter carnival but if it is, then Heathcote will be enormously satisfied with his star’s glittering career, which includes four Group 2 victories.

“Any horse that’s achieved what he has will always hold a special place in my heart. And it’s a fair call that horses like those become public property,” the trainer said.

“He’s popular and he’s competed at the highest level on three legs.”

Originally published as Trainer Rob Heathcote says he won’t be pressured into retiring his ‘miracle horse’ Rothfire