Walter Swinburn, the three-times Derby-winning jockey, announced yesterday that he is likely to miss the rest of the season in order to overcome recurrent weight problems.

But there are no plans for retirement despite this being the second long sabbatical that Swinburn has embarked on within the last 18 months.

The jockey had previously announced on August 14th that he was having a week's break because of a re-occurrence of a weight problem which led him to take a 10-month break from race riding in April 1997.

Swinburn said in a statement: "I regret that my return to the saddle will be later than estimated when I made the statement about my recurrent weight problems earlier this month. "It now looks unlikely that I shall return before the end of the season, though anything is possible."