Flying Mascot (NZ) (Tavistock) starred during last season’s Melbourne Festival of Racing but will be inactive during the upcoming seven-week period of feature racing.

Trainer Tom Dabernig told Racing.com that the five-year-old mare is halfway through an extended break in the spelling paddock.

The daughter of Tavistock most recently contested the A$300,000 Tristarc Stakes (1400m) at Caulfield on October 15, finishing 10th in the Group Two mares event won by Chain Of Lightning (Fighting Sun).

“She pulled up with a hairline stress fracture at the top of her cannon bone, it was discovered after her last run in the Tristarc,” Dabernig said.

“She wasn’t quite right in her action, so we sent her to Ballarat for scintigraphy and they found the issue.

“The vets say there’s a good prognosis of recovery, but she required four months of rest in the paddock.

“That will probably rule out the autumn, we might be ready for Adelaide, and if she doesn’t come up, she could go straight to stud.”

Flying Mascot has been Dabernig’s headline performer since making the decision to train in his own right from Warrnambool in mid-2021.

She won the Gr.3 Tesio Stakes (1600m) on the 2021 Cox Plate undercard and claimed another two fillies and mares’ G3 events the following autumn with victories in the Mannerism Stakes (1400m) and Matron Stakes (1600m).

Flying Mascot’s victory in the Matron Stakes was Dabernig’s first win as a sole trainer at Flemington and his tally now stands at three after Hasseltoff (Toorak Toff) won twice at Headquarters, most recently on New Year’s Day.