Multiple stakes winner Miss Missile sidelined

Miss Missile, an 11-time stakes winner based in Texas, will be out of action for at least three months after she was found to have a hairline fracture in her left foreleg just before shipping to New Mexico for a stakes in late November.

"We got lucky we found it before we did any structural damage," said Charlie Smith, who owns and trains Miss Missile.

Miss Missile was diagnosed with a nondisplaced hairline fracture in a left front sesamoid. It will simply require time to let the slight fracture heal back together, said Smith.

"We're giving her time to let it calcify up," he said.

Smith said under ideal circumstances, Miss Missile could return to action at the end of March. He said plans are to run her next year as a 5-year-old. Miss Missile has won stakes throughout North America, and to date she has compiled a record of 16 wins from 31 starts for earnings of $427,068.

In her most recent out she won the $60,000 Mademoiselle at Delta Downs on Oct. 14.

Smith could be headed to Delta next month with Ruby's Big Band, a three-time stakes winner who was second in the $50,000 Bara Lass for 2-year-old fillies at Sam Houston on Dec. 5. Smith said she would be considered for the $60,000 Genesis at seven furlongs on Jan. 15.

Ruby's Big Band, a daughter of Bowman's Band, races for Terry Propps.