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Keiai Nautique to join trainer’s Warwick Farm stable

Matthew Smith will be hoping Grade 1 winner Keiai Nautique (Deep Impact) will fill the void left by the three-time Group 1 winning brother Fierce Impact when the six-year-old joins the trainers Warwick Farm stable. 

The six-year-old hasn’t won since claiming the NHK Mile Cup (Gr 1, 1600m) in Japan in May 2018 and was last seen running 15th in the Sports Nippon Sho Kyoto Kimpai (Gr 3, 1600m) on January 5. 

Connections are hopeful the move to Smith can reignite the entire’s career, with the trainer having great success with Fierce Impact, who was retired to Leneva Stud last month. 

“They reached out to us to see if we would take him. I think they are thinking the other horse (Fierce Impact) did so well and he (Keiai Nautique) lost a bit of form up in Japan, so they thought maybe send him to Australia and see how he goes, a change of scenery,” Smith told Racing.com. 

“He is a lot like him (Fierce Impact). He looks a lot like him, probably a bigger horse.

“He has only been here a week so we will find our way with him, but he’s a nice horse.”

Smith said he was keen to have Keiai Nautique ready for a spring campaign where it was likely he would be targeted at races ove a mile.

“He won his Group 1 over a mile, that’s where his best form is. That’s mainly the distance he runs over over there,” he said.

“But we will see how we go, see what he’s like after he does a bit of work here. He’s had a couple of months off, so he will have a break and it will be interesting to see.”