Australian trainer Shane Baertschiger is the latest addition to a growing list of names walking away from Kranji before its closure. He is retiring from racing after a 30-year career in South-East Asia.
The meeting at Kranji on Sunday, December 17 marked the 50-year-old’s final day before he relocates with his Singaporean family to Melbourne, Australia. The Baertschiger name has been synonymous with racing in the region since the early nineties when Shane, then a 20-year-old, joined his father Don in Kuala Lumpur.
Baertschiger, who took over his father’s training business in Singapore upon Don’s retirement in 2012, expressed that the sudden decision to shut down the racing industry had come as a devastating blow to participants. Reportedly, he has no plans to continue working in racing upon returning to Australia.
“I came here when I was 20 and spent six years in KL before moving to Singapore in 1999. Training horses is in my blood, but what happened here (Singapore) has made me go off racing. I’m not interested to work in racing in Australia. I’ll just be unemployed.”
Baertschiger clinched his first Group 1 race, fittingly the same race his father last won, the Lion City Cup with Aramco in 2019. Five months later, he secured his second Group 1 success with I’m Incredible in the Queen Elizabeth II Cup. Thereafter, he has added two more Group 1 victories to his record with Aramaayo in the Kranji Mile and the Raffles Cup in 2020.
