SIMON NOTT: Whipping Up A Storm

I was at Bath Racecourse when the new whip regulations filtered through. I think most people that I spoke to on the day were in favour of making breaking the rules result in disqualifying a horse, in theory at least.

The new rules do appear ambiguous and still allow jockeys to break the rules to win races and keep them. Shouldn’t be a threshold which if stepped over results in a ban for the jockey and a disqualification for the horse and that’s that? As I understand the new rules, a jockey can hit their horse three times over the permitted seven on the flat or eight over jumps, and still win the race though can expect a ban, a fourth results in the horse being disqualified. Why the permitted rule-breaking buffer zone?

 

I’ll leave that to people better qualified than me to thrash out, excuse the pun. What did get me thinking though were the practicalities and ramifications for bookmakers, especially those plying their trade on course. Currently, most pay on the official result but take a chance on paying punters out early if it looks as if there’s unlikely to be a problem. They only hold up payment should there be a possibility of an enquiry or of course a ‘bing-bong’ announcing one. That’s fairly easy, most on-course bookies have watched enough races to know when to be cautious.

The new potential for a winner to be disqualified because the jockey was overzealous with the whip makes life for racecourse bookies a little trickier. Not so much at smaller meetings, the jockeys are professionals, even the ones that aren’t, and four extra is a lot, you’d hope that disqualifications won’t be an issue.

The bigger problem arises at the prestigious meetings with an awful lot at stake. How are those big handicaps going to be policed by the stewards looking for whip use infringements? Are they going to assign a person per horse in a race like the Wokingham for example? In an ideal world they would, with a finger hovering over a bing-bong button as soon as it looks as if a jockey has gone for the stick too many times. Are there going to be people going back over the video of a race looking to object should it look as if a winner has been shown the Pro-Cush once too often? How long will it take to weigh-in and make races official before bookmakers can pay out.

How are racegoers who maybe don’t really understand the sport going to react when their selection which just prevails in a thrilling photo if theirs is disqualified?

Are jockeys going to be instructed to not spare the whip, over three strokes but under four, when a horse has been plotted up and the money is down? Are connections that give such orders going to be hauled before the Stewards and have their livelihoods taken away from them for doing so or is the jockey desperate for rides going to take one for the team?

And what of the image and attraction to the sport when a jockey sticks to the rules and stops trying to persuade his horse to give it’s all when they’ve delivered their seven or eight strokes, only to short-headed by a flagrant rule-breaker who has gone for a couple more.

And off course, is this the end of ‘Double result’ settling? Are the firms going to stand for paying out twice a whole lot more than their accounts said they would when deciding on the policy? Especially when a couple of right old touches are landed whip illegally.

Way above my pay grade or expertise, but is the breeding industry going to accept that the winner of the Derby wasn’t actually the winner? Disqualified, not because of interference and subsequent fair demotion but because it showed its stamina, mettle and tenacity under maximum pressure one over the four?

Penultimately, if as we have been told by the industry many many times, a horse isn’t hurt by a jockey wielding a Pro-Cush, why go down this road at all?

As a final word, am I doing jockeys a massive disservice with all these hypothetical scenarios? Of course, they’ll be counting and abide by the rules, in which case, there’s nothing to see here apart from a positive step forward.

It’s going to be interesting.

SIMON NOTT

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Views of authors do not necessarily represent views of Star Sports Bookmakers.

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Simon Nott is author of: Skint Mob! Tales from the Betting Ring
available on Kindle CLICK HERE FOR MORE DETAILS

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