Watching Royal Ascot yesterday I saw one of the greatest horse races I've ever seen. The ex-Aussie 'wonder horse', So You Think, went off at 4/11 - that means if you wanted to win £4 you'd have to risk losing £11 - in the Prince of Wales's Stakes. That made him probably the hottest favourite of the week, and before the race his trainer, Aidan O'Brien oozed confidence, telling us that this was a very special horse.
However, things didn't go according to the script as Frankie Dettori gave Rewilding one of the best rides I've ever seen any jockey give a horse (no, I didn't back him so I'm not talking through my pocket), to edge it in the final strides. Rewilding was hugely brave, and Dettori was inspired - it was the sort of spectacle that makes racing the great sport that it is.
How then do we explain to racing's audience the nine-day ban that Dettori got for using his whip 'with excessive frequency'? It was totally absurd to ban a jockey for winning the race by getting his horse to give every ounce of effort, but that's the way that the crazy rules work.
Racing's rulers have made an abject surrender to the well-intentioned but misguided do-gooders who don't like seeing horses hit with the whip. It's the job of the trainer to get his horse really fit, and then the jockey has to get it to try its best to win. If a horse is being mistreated it will dig its heels in and not show its best - Dettori did not do anything that damaged Rewilding in any way and should not have been banned.
Dettori weighs less then nine stones soaking wet, and when he's riding he isn't allowed to let his lightweight whip be delivered from above shoulder height - try it for yourself and see how much, or rather, how little effort can be applied from that position. I don't know what Rewilding weighs, but it's a damned site more than nine stones and I seriously doubt that the horse felt pain from Dettori's whip - if he had then he'd have stopped trying his heart out. Was it the legendary trainer George Lambton who described Flat racing as little men on big horses?
There are times when the whip can be abused. and on those occasions the jockeys should be punished. An exhausted National Hunt horse being whipped at the end of a three-mile race in the mud is an unedifying spectacle - and those jockeys are bigger, can hit harder, and the races are longer. But in Flat racing? No, I don't believe I've seen anything that I would describe as abuse.
Sport is about winning, and the best horse won yesterday. When Dettori used his whip he was encouraging / asking Rewilding to try his hardest for him, and it was a joy to see the horse's obvious desire to give his partner everything he could, and show an indomitable will to win. The authorities need to get a grip, and fast, as they're making a mockery out of a wonderful sport, and sadly they're doing it to appease a minority.
If you want one final, and totally damning piece of evidence that shows that there's nothing wrong with using the whip in racing, then here it is: John McCririck, plainly a total madman, would like the whip banned. The defence rests its case.
Showing posts with label Horse Racing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Horse Racing. Show all posts
Thursday, 16 June 2011
Wednesday, 25 May 2011
Pain and death
I'm opposed to blood sports - always have been, and, had you asked me anytime up until a couple of days ago I would have said that I always will be. However, I've just heard an interview that has made me think.
Sir Mark Prescott is a racehorse trainer, exceptionally bright and articulate, a tad eccentric, and a big fan of hare coursing and bull-fighting. Interviewed on Racing UK he made a comment to the following effect. The difference between the countryman and the town dweller is that the countryman worries about suffering, whereas his urban counterpart worries about death. Sharp, indignant intake of breath from me, and probably from you too.
He then went on to say that the countryside is a cruel place, and that death is a fact of life on a farm - the dogs are working animals and when they can no longer work are despatched, and all of the stock on the farm is bred to either be slaughtered, or used until their working life is done. Farmers accept death, and those of us that are meat-eaters sign up to that contract. What a farmer doesn't like is to see an animal suffering - the old horse gets shot, the sheepdog that can no longer work gets killed, and so on. During the Foot and Mouth crisis farmers wept to see their herds being killed, even though they knew that was to be the animals' eventual fate - it was the suffering that upset them so. However, the town-dweller is happy to get the vet to keep their old blind dog alive, even when he's bumping into the furniture, or keep their rabbit in a tiny hutch, remove their cat's claws so it can't hunt, and so on - they are happy to let their pet suffer because they can't cope with death.
He then went on to argue that there isn't that much between what he calls the 'rational anti' and the hunting enthusiast - both worry about suffering. The anti worries that a hare might be torn apart by a greyhound, and the hunter worries about hares dying a slow, painful death in a field when it can no longer run. The fact that intrigued me most is that the previous three heads of the League Against Cruel Sport all came to accept that hare coursing was, on balance, better for the welfare of hares than a ban would be! When Sir Mark was an advisor to a programme about hares, the producer was staggered to find that the leading authority on hares and their habitat was the man who ran the Waterloo Cup - the premier hare coursing event in Britain. The man who was most involved with hare conservation also set his dogs to chase them! He knew, said Prescott, that the very few that got caught by the dogs were the ones that were the weak ones and which would, in any rate, shortly die - Darwin had a thing or two to say on that subject.
Am I now a blood sports fan? No, of course not. Am I now as violently opposed to them as I once was? No, I'm not - Prescott's comments have given me cause to reflect on my position.
Sir Mark Prescott is a racehorse trainer, exceptionally bright and articulate, a tad eccentric, and a big fan of hare coursing and bull-fighting. Interviewed on Racing UK he made a comment to the following effect. The difference between the countryman and the town dweller is that the countryman worries about suffering, whereas his urban counterpart worries about death. Sharp, indignant intake of breath from me, and probably from you too.
He then went on to say that the countryside is a cruel place, and that death is a fact of life on a farm - the dogs are working animals and when they can no longer work are despatched, and all of the stock on the farm is bred to either be slaughtered, or used until their working life is done. Farmers accept death, and those of us that are meat-eaters sign up to that contract. What a farmer doesn't like is to see an animal suffering - the old horse gets shot, the sheepdog that can no longer work gets killed, and so on. During the Foot and Mouth crisis farmers wept to see their herds being killed, even though they knew that was to be the animals' eventual fate - it was the suffering that upset them so. However, the town-dweller is happy to get the vet to keep their old blind dog alive, even when he's bumping into the furniture, or keep their rabbit in a tiny hutch, remove their cat's claws so it can't hunt, and so on - they are happy to let their pet suffer because they can't cope with death.
He then went on to argue that there isn't that much between what he calls the 'rational anti' and the hunting enthusiast - both worry about suffering. The anti worries that a hare might be torn apart by a greyhound, and the hunter worries about hares dying a slow, painful death in a field when it can no longer run. The fact that intrigued me most is that the previous three heads of the League Against Cruel Sport all came to accept that hare coursing was, on balance, better for the welfare of hares than a ban would be! When Sir Mark was an advisor to a programme about hares, the producer was staggered to find that the leading authority on hares and their habitat was the man who ran the Waterloo Cup - the premier hare coursing event in Britain. The man who was most involved with hare conservation also set his dogs to chase them! He knew, said Prescott, that the very few that got caught by the dogs were the ones that were the weak ones and which would, in any rate, shortly die - Darwin had a thing or two to say on that subject.
Am I now a blood sports fan? No, of course not. Am I now as violently opposed to them as I once was? No, I'm not - Prescott's comments have given me cause to reflect on my position.
Sunday, 1 May 2011
Sporting greatness
I know that lots of people don't really 'get' horse-racing, but if you get the chance to see the replay of Frankel winning the 2000 Guineas it's well worth a look. I've been a racing fan for longer than I care to remember, but I've never, ever seen anything like it. These are the best three-year old colts around, and they are all good horses - some of them very good - but he simply toyed with them and won by as far as his jockey wanted.
He's trained by the great Henry Cecil - a man with a mix of genius and human frailty that the Briitish racing public finds irresistible. To my generation he's simply known as 'god', and when he revealed that jockey Tom Queally had told him that there was more in Frankel's tank had it been needed, I nearly fell off my chair. It would be great if Frankel went on to win again, but if he doesn't, then no matter - on the day that counted he was, I believe, the best horse I've ever seen.
He's trained by the great Henry Cecil - a man with a mix of genius and human frailty that the Briitish racing public finds irresistible. To my generation he's simply known as 'god', and when he revealed that jockey Tom Queally had told him that there was more in Frankel's tank had it been needed, I nearly fell off my chair. It would be great if Frankel went on to win again, but if he doesn't, then no matter - on the day that counted he was, I believe, the best horse I've ever seen.
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