WE received some good news today with regards to Shishkin who, after conducting some follow up bone scans last week, he has been given the green light to resume normal proceedings and return to full training.

It’s worth explaining what actually happened after Cheltenham when he was lame in unspecific departments; basically he was a bit lame here and a bit lame there which meant it was hard to diagnose what was actually wrong with him, so we did a full skeletal body scan of which we discovered that he was suffering from an extremely rare bone condition called Enostosis-like lesions. Five of which were identified in the ‘long bones’, which is the relevant thing, it’s not in the joints but places like the Cannon Bone, Tibia, Femur and such like, and these were quite obvious on the original bone scan but I’m pleased to say that after his latest scan there is no evidence of any of them anymore, so we are now good to go.

He’s had a long summer of recuperation at Charlie and Tracy Vigors’ Hillwood Stud, where he always goes for his holidays, and while he was never turned out with the others in a massive field he was able to enjoy his own space in a more restricted area and under controlled ‘exercise’ throughout the whole time. There isn’t much medication you can give for this unique condition, it’s just a case of allowing everything to heal in its own time and thankfully everything is now completely clean and there is no evidence of anything existing anymore. Apparently there is no reason why he should get it (again) more than any other horse because it is extremely rare to have it at all, let alone more than once, so there should be nothing to worry about in the future.

Obviously, the question on many people’s mind will be the time scale and when he’ll be on a racecourse again and at this stage it is simply to early to speculate.

The Tingle Creek is on Saturday 3^rd December and I’d hesitate to say that’s what we’re aiming at but it’s still quite possible he’ll get to Sandown if everything goes well, although only he can tell us that.

He’s not starting from complete scratch as he’s done lots of prep work with the Vigors family and returned to Seven Barrows about a month ago where he’s been spending lots of time on the horse walker and doing plenty of build-up work, so we do have something to work on which means there is at least a chance of him making Sandown. If he’s not ready in time, we’ll go the same route as last year and look at the Desert Orchid Chase and then the Clarence House. As always, he comes first, and we certainly won’t be rushing him into anything.

At the end of the day this is all very good news and he looks absolutely magnificent. Everything is going to plan so I couldn’t be happier.

This is always a great time of the year for us because all the horses have returned from their holidays, some looking like they’ve enjoyed a few too many pies! But they all look great and we’ve sorted out a few issues here and there and things are good. Constitution Hill is hacking away nicely while Jonbon and Epatante are in tremendous shape. Chantry House has grown two inches and has had wind surgery so hopefully that will sort his problems out and I’m delighted with Champ as well.