Two-time Darwin Cup champion Hawks Bay retired

VICTORIAN trainer Neil Dyer will look to six-year-old gelding Cantonese to win his third Darwin Cup after two-time champion Hawks Bay was retired yesterday.

Trainer Neil Dyer with Hawkes Bay, winner of the Darwin Cup two years in a row and returning for a third attempt to take out the triple crown

VICTORIAN trainer Neil Dyer will look to six-year-old gelding Cantonese to win his third Darwin Cup after two-time champion Hawks Bay was retired yesterday.

Hawks Bay, who has had continuing leg problems, will head to the paddock after an amazing career, highlighted by his Fannie Bay record.

But NT racing fans will have one final chance to farewell the horse, with Hawks Bay likely to lead the Breakfast with the Stars Darwin Cup parade.

Dyer said last night that he had brought Hawks Bay to Darwin in the hope that he could recover but that has not been the case.

“I decided to pull the pin with him before anything more serious happened,” he said.

“He came up here with a minor leg problem which we were managing.

“But then he developed an upper leg problem which forced me into making the decision.’’

Dyer said last week that he would take no chances with his star, promising Hawks Bay, who has earned more than $870,000 in his career, would only have another tilt at the race that stops a city if he was fully fit.

That career also produced 14 wins from 61 starts and Dyer was instrumental in bringing Hawks Bay to Darwin for the three-year-old races, the Darwin Guineas and the NT Derby, in 2011.

Dyer said: “Having won those he continued in that preparation to run second in the Darwin Cup as a four-year-old.’’

His Darwin Cup win of 2012 was arguably his finest hour in the Top End.

After winning his first Cup the year before by four lengths, he carried 64.5kg to runner-up Bolton with 57kg in 2012.

“Hawks Bay led into the straight, was headed by Bolton, and showed enormous determination and courage to fight back and win in a photo by a nose,” Dyer said.

Now Dyer’s Cup hopes rest with the six-year-old son of Redoute’s Choice.

“Cantonese was a good performer in Sydney and he was bought for the Darwin Cup a couple of years ago,” he said.

Cantonese has had two starts at Fannie Bay, finishing sixth of nine over 1200m on June 14 and ninth of 11 over 1300m on June 28.