Top stallion Speightstown undergoes colic surgery

Speightstown, the 2004 sprint champion and now North America’s third-leading general sire, underwent colic surgery Saturday for a nephrosplenic entrapment, according to WinStar Farm, which stands the 14-year-old Gone West horse.

A nephrosplenic entrapment occurs when the horse’s large intestine becomes hooked over the nephrosplenic ligament, which connects the spleen to the left kidney. Speightstown’s prognosis is “excellent,” according to Dr. Nathan Slovis of the Hagyard Equine Medical Institute, the Lexington, Ky., equine hospital where the surgery took place.

“Commonly enough, the large intestine can become hooked over the nephrosplenic ligament, but once on the table the problem was rectified in less than 15 minutes,” Slovis said in a release WinStar issued Sunday afternoon. “We’re 24 hours post-surgery now, and his prognosis is excellent. We will be releasing him back to the farm in the morning.”

WinStar president Elliott Walden said the stallion should heal in plenty of time to stand a normal season in 2013.

Speightstown stood this year for $50,000. His 20 stakes-winners this year include Travers dead-heat winner Golden Ticket and such graded winners as Jersey Town, Sum of the Parts, Essence Hit Man, and Delegation.