LAST year’s Triple Crown winner Louis The King was taken out of the Durban July on Monday after fracturing a sesamoid in a gallop on Saturday. He has been retired.

“It was his near-fore and the same foot that he injured when he almost came down in last year’s July,” said trainer Geoff Woodruff. “I’m not certain but we think that that injury could have weakened the bone.”

Louis The King, a great favourite with the crowds, really captured the public imagination when winning the South African Guineas, Classic and Derby at Turffontein but Woodruff was puzzled by his below par effort in the J & B Met at Kenilworth in January.

He was inclined to blame the poor pace at the time but later he came to the conclusion that it was a problem with one of the horse’s testicles. This was removed and the operation puts a question mark over the Black Minnaloushe colt’s future as a stallion.