The importance of getting a grip

It's always a pleasure to go to Brighton, and yesterday was no exception.  The going there wasn't much fun for a while, though.  We left with plenty of time in hand and sailed along for the first 55 miles at a time (ie mid-morning) when one expects the roads to be as clear as they were.  But then there was a serious delay on the M25 approaching the Dartford Bridge, and it ended up taking us three hours to cover the first 60 miles.  I don't think that I've ever had a non-runner for failing to get there in time, but yesterday we came the closest to it that I've had: we arrived an hour and a quarter before the race.

But that was fine.  Parek had travelled very well and was very relaxed when she got there, and she urinated as soon as she was put into her stable, and then went to sleep.  So all was good.  She ran OK too, finishing fifth of 14, but it was just a bit frustrating.  Her half-sister Ethics Girl loved fast ground.  Sussex Girl is like Ethics Girl physically, and she really struggled on very soft ground as a two-year-old.  This led me to feel that she wanted fast ground, but it ended up that she recorded her two wins at the tail-end of last season with cut in the ground.  We've ended up running mostly on fast ground this season, but I was thinking that we'd finally find soft ground in the autumn.

So she went to Brighton yesterday for the race which she won last year, and did so shortly after the whole country had received a drenching.  But, of course, Brighton is a law unto itself, and we managed to race on the only fast ground anywhere this week.  It was very quick yesterday, and we just received confirmation that, while she runs OK on fast ground, she just isn't quite effective on it as she is on the soft.  Frustrating.  She's in at Yarmouth on Tuesday, in the other race which she won last year, but she's not certain to get in - and the way things are going, I'd fear that the ground at Yarmouth, which has been on the soft side the last two meetings, will be fast again by Tuesday.  Sometimes you just can't take a trick.

What else has been happening?  Well, it's a case of knowing which of the many stories are the most significant.  The media usually sort it out for us and we just assume that the stories which get the top billing are the big ones, but it must be hard for them to know when all the stories arrive without an order of importance attached.  And the media get it wrong too, as we found this week.  When the Brexit talks collapsed two days before what had been billed as the decisive summit, that was the second story on the news on the BBC.  The first story that day was that Meghan Markle was pregnant.  (Mind you, even that was big news compared to a story which I'm told was highlighted by the ABC the other day, when the Duke of Sussex picked up a plastic straw on the beach).

What I'm worrying about is that a story which I hope is insignificant may end up being the big story of the week.  Or year.  Time will tell, I suppose (as always).  That is the story, covered typically excellently by Chris Cook in the Guardian, of the racing debate in parliament, which seems to have concluded half-heartedly that it's OK for the BHA to continue to run racing for the time being, but that the sport has must become less dangerous for the horses if the current arrangement is to continue.  Of course, we all want it to become less dangerous for the horses, but in practice there is only so much that can be done.  And if that turns out not to be enough for our overlords, what then?

You don't have to think about this too long or too deeply to realise that this could be more important than all the other stories put together.  And that is extremely worrying.  Chris Cook's article's headline and sub-headline said it all: 'Horse welfare is an issue for racing and not just the BHA', and 'The whole sport will have to accept the need for continued effort and improvement in this area if MPs are to be satisfied'.  And this brings us on nicely to one of the weirdest stories of the recent past: that the Ride of the Year prize at the recent McCoy's National Hunt racing awards ceremony went to a ride (by Patrick Mullins, winning the National Hunt Chase on Rathvinden) which incurred a whip suspension.

I know that we know that the whip is not a matter of life and death, and that in the great scheme of things is not a welfare issue.  But as parliament has just reminded us, it is a very visible issue and it is thus a big issue.  One can be tempted, not without some justification, to see the whip rules as an unnecessary evil, as an inconvenience which flies in the face of the necessary competitive element of the sport.  But we must not see them like that.  Basically, the judges of this award need to get a grip.  In their defence, they made the decision prior to this subsequent parliamentary debate which has helped us (forced us) to focus on the real issues; but really - they do need to get a grip!

You just can't go giving prizes to rides which break the rules, and particularly not to rides which break a rule designed to show the public that looking after the horse is more important than winning the race.  (And for any true horseman, winning the race should always be secondary to looking after the horse).  That was just so bloody stupid, and I hope won't be repeated.  Mind you, we had something very similar in Melbourne last weekend, when Ride of the Day at Caulfield on Caulfield Guineas Day went to James McDonald's winning ride on Yucatan in the Herbert Power Handicap, a ride which earned him a reprimand from the stewards for doing something which I would describe as shockingly irresponsible and dangerous.

James had previously picked up an 11-meeting suspension for careless riding on Meryl in the third race.  I didn't see that race, but I can't see that it could have been any more dangerous than what he did on Yucatan.  All was copybook until the final 50m.  Yucatan turned out to have a ton in hand, skipping clear at the 500m and holding an eight-length lead at the furlong pole, still travelling strongly.  It was all so straightforward – until, inexplicably, James eased Yucatan heavily in the final 50m.  The horse was decelerating rapidly in the final strides – while behind him Brimham Rocks and (A) Prince of Arran were battling it out for the minors.  Stephen Baster and Michael Walker were riding hard, heads down, and the battle lasted all the way to the line.

There was only a neck between them as they passed the post, and Yucatan only won by a length and a half.  So strongly were the other two finishing and so prematurely had James started to pull up Yucatan that Brimham Rocks was in front three strides after the line.  It was more by luck (and, of course, Michael Walker's quick thinking) than judgement that Prince Of Arran didn't run into the back of Yucatan, which would likely have been fatal for Yucatan, and very possibly for Prince of Arran too.  God knows what got into James to make him do something so stupid - it was like a dangerous version of Luke Nolen's infamous "brain fade" on Black Caviar at Ascot.

Thank God Luke taking his eye of the ball didn't get Black Caviar beaten, and thank God James taking his eye of the ball didn't get Yucatan killed.  But the one could just as easily have happened as the other.  Nobody suggested giving Luke the 'Ride of the Day' prize on Black Caviar, so God only knows what possessed the judges to award it to James McDonald on Saturday.  Singling someone out for a special prize for massively increasing his mount's chance of being killed is as silly as singling someone else out for a special prize for breaking the whip rules at the highest-profile meeting in the calendar.