Tuesday, December 31, 2019

Old year, new year

I've survived another year.  Well, not quite, but if I get through another 11 hours I will have done.  That's good.  I tend generally to subscribe to the school of thought that isn't taken in by the whole New Year nonsense, in that one day becomes the next whether it's 17th August becoming the 18th or 31st December becoming the 1st of January.  But, inexplicably, I am approaching this particular New Year with a spirit of optimism.  That truly is inexplicable as we've had easily the worst year of results I've put together in 25 years of training.  And it's been a year with more than the usual share of sadness.  But the human spirit is (or is meant to be) a resilient one, and I suppose I'm working on the (dubious) logic of 'things can only get better'.

Even looking into it more deeply it is still hard to find the reasons for my optimism.  We aren't starting the New Year with any new horses, only the ones we have had in 2019 minus a few that have retired; and the ones which we have are obviously a year older - although in some cases, probably the majority, that fact encourages my irrational brain to suppose that they may do better than in the past, rather than worse.  Whatever - it might just be that 2019 is a year I'm happy to put behind me.  Roll on 2020!  (Even though, I won't greet it in person as I imagine that I'll be asleep by around 9pm, as usual).

We ended our racing year in much the same style as we had spent the majority of it.  Our final outing of the year, to Wolverhampton on Friday 27th December, was a total write-off.  Thanks largely to the fact that she was drawn so wide (and also that I was very mindful that the form of her close second in a small-field maiden race might not translate at all to the very different conditions of a full-field of seasoned handicappers, notwithstanding that the horse who beat her a neck in that race had won at Wolverhampton the previous day by nine lengths) I did not go there with particularly high hopes for Hidden Pearl.  Which was just as well as the race could hardly have gone worse (well, that's not true as she got round and neither horse nor rider were hurt) and she finished 10th of 13 (with, irrelevantly, the horse whom I had thought most likely to win the race, Herm, two places behind her in 12th).

On the subject of horses and riders (not) getting hurt, I've had a good idea.  That does happen occasionally (although on the majority of occasions when I think that I've had a good idea, it generally turns out that the idea isn't as good as I had originally thought).  But on this occasion this really might be a good idea.  Suspended sentences.  This has been brought on by a film clip which Kevin Blake posted on Twitter of the head-on view of the finish of a jumps race in Ireland a couple of weeks ago.  To my untrained eye it looked as bad a case of dangerous riding as you'd ever see but the stewards appeared to demur, giving the rider (of the runner-up, which was fortunate as it meant that they did not have to demote or disqualify a winner) a four-day ban for 'careless riding'.

Kevin was clearly as stunned by the riding and by the verdict as I was.  He commented, "The rider of the runner-up got a four-day ban for careless riding. What kind of carnage would have to ensue for Irish/British stewards to pass down a verdict of dangerous riding?  This obscenely lenient stewarding won't end well."  That's my fear, too.  It's one upon which I have touched frequently in this blog in the past.  This was an Irish race so one might think that it's harsh of Kevin to be bringing British stewards into the discussion, but in fairness we have all too often seen similar a disinclination by British stewards to take a firm line as regards trying to discourage dangerous riding.

The point of the matter is that punishing the rider per se is not what matters: it is ensuring that the rider does not ever again ride with such disdain for the safety of his fellow competitors, human or equine.  I don't know the identity of the rider, but I got the impression that he's probably a conditional.  And clearly a very good one because, leaving aside that he rode without regard for the safety of the horse and rider alongside him and seemingly with an attitude that his winning the race was more important than not causing a fall, he looks to ride very well indeed.

How to ensure that he changes his attitude and becomes the top-class jockey that he looks to have the potential to become?  Is telling him that he has ridden carelessly but not improperly or dangerously, and giving him a four-day ban, the right method?  On the face of it it isn't, as much as regards the verdict as the length of the ban.  One would hope that the some of the senior riders would have given him a hell of a verbal rocket in the changing room afterwards, but the fact that some of them tweeted their support of his ride suggests that that probably didn't happen.

They should have known better, although I'm sure that the rider of the horse with whom he interfered (again, I don't know and don't want to know it was) would not have been so forgiving.  It's hard to see why they should be so keen to speak up for someone who shows so little respect for the safety of his fellow riders, but there you go.  I'd be happier with the observations of experienced jockeys able to take a detached viewpoint, eg Willie Ryan (tweeting, "Appalling piece of horsemanship.  Bend the rules for sure, we all done that but that was just ridiculous and why our sport is going quickly downhill.  This type of riding cannot be seen.  It is putting both horse and rider at huge risk.  It's just wrong.") or Seb Sanders (tweeting, "... This type of riding is dangerous or intentional which is rarely used by stewards because they haven't got the balls to charge any jockey for it.").

Peer pressure would be the best way of educating him.  In its absence, action by the stewards has to suffice.  So here's how I would go about it.  When a rider is guilty of dangerous riding and/or intentional interference, find him guilty of that and give him, say, a six-month suspension - but suspend all of that sentence (maybe bar a couple of days) for, say, two years.  If he commits any instances of genuinely careless riding or accidental interference in that time, he'll have the standard accidental interference/careless riding penalty but the suspended sentence won't come into play.  But if he were to commit another instance of dangerous riding and/or intentional interference (and you can more or less guarantee that he won't do so) then the suspended 178 or however many days would be applied.  Seemples.  That would pretty much guarantee that deliberately dangerous riding would be eliminated, which would be great news for everyone, particularly the jockeys and the horses.  And you'd have done so without having to impose any heavy-handed punishments.

More immediately - Roll on 2020!  As of tomorrow, 2019 is forgotten.  Everyone's scores are back down to zero, so we're not doing any worse than anyone else.  Our score will stay on zero for at least 10 days (as our first entry of 2020 will be on 11th January) and probably for considerably longer than that, but let's hope that it can start to rise at some point.  And then keep rising!

3 comments:

glenn.pennington said...

There is a saying John "How do you make a small fortune out of horseracing? - answer -start with a large fortune."

It admittedly hasn't been a very good year, and my stock of shillings has diminished somewhat (into the bookies pockets -nothing new about that) as I followed your runners, in the blind hope that maybe one could demonstate winning ability on the track rather than on the gallops.

However, I have greatly enjoyed and learned from your writings over this and previous years, and will probably continue to do so in 2020. The thrill is in the chase (allegedly), and a bad day at the races allegedly beats a good day at work.

One good horse might be all it takes....



neil kearns said...

Happy New Year John to you , your family and all your staff

Saw the race concerned how the guy just wasn't thrown out of the sport for months is beyond me one of the worst episodes I have seen , how his peers didn't string him up from the winning post is beyond me .

Perhaps it is time for a real look at the rules because tome far too much leniency seems to be given to first past the post and the French rules seem to me to be far less likely to cause really serious injury if you know touching an opponent will get you thrown out you aren't going to go there know most disagree but thats how I see it

neil kearns said...

So the great and the good at the BHA have decided Mr Henderson is not being transparent , very rich from an organisation that refuses to do something as simple as broadcast all stewards enquiries so the collective racing family have a clue what is going on .
Maybe my evil mind but wonder if a grandee is upset NH got a gong and they didn't !!