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It was evidently unideal. A manager has to deal with the circumstances in front of them. Pretty sure he would have opted for no hole on the track as a preference :)
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parispike: There were no problems with the track yesterday after Pullen had railed off the relevant area. In the next ten weeks there will be more rain, more frost, more vehicles on the track, and that will indeed require the full assessment promised by Pullen before the Festival. But in the conditions as they were at 4.38 yesterday, after over half an hour of careful investigation, all was found to be fine.
I don't see a contradiction between being 100% certain that the revised track was safe at 4.38 pm yesterday, but doing a full assessment to make sure nothing else deteriorates over the next ten weeks. And to those complaining about the light at 4.38 yesterday, the last race at Hereford tomorrow (only 40 miles west of Cheltenham) is due off at 4.30. The visibility really was fine for racing yesterday. The photo finish equipment turned out to be not up to scratch, but what is the point of all those Racetech cameras covering the race if you can't use them as a backup option? |
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sfbtw - there is no evidence that the track was "safe". That the race was run without incident is neither here or there. Had something catastrophic happened legal action was have been taken - the outcome of which would have been in no doubt.
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Parispike, there was no evidence that the track was unsafe either? I am as sure as anyone can be that had there been the slightest doubt concerning safety the race would not have been run, as for legal action, by whom IYO?
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Presumably the appropriate checks were completed before racing started. Which didn't unearth the risk of a ruddy great big hole. Risk can't be eliminated. Never racing on the track again would be the safest option. What they can demonstrate, and what would need to be demonstrated (in a strongly hypothetical court case, we are reaching here) is due diligence.
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Legal action by jockeys , trainers and owners.
A proportionate approach given what was known and not known would be to abandon the race. The race card carries the message that "the safety of participants, equine and human, is of a paramount importance" Clearly it isn't. |
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Of course risk can never be entirely eliminated. That's not the standard. Were it so no activity whatsoever would ever happen.
It's about what is proportionate. In this instance the proportionate approach would be to abandon the race. |
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They weren't forced to take part. It's only the horses themselves that could have an argument (difficult), and jumps horses face a far bigger risk every time they are asked to take on an obstacle.
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The jockeys and trainers were given the choice to run or not so that leaves the owners who were not onboard, however many that might have been their only possible legal action would be against the trainer, not the Course?
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pp, it's fair enough for people to have the opinion that the last should have been abandoned. but that's all it is. nobody is right or wrong as such, but people are paid to make those judgements. I'm fairly sure Lydia could become a clerk if she wanted it, and have the responsibility for those decisions. As it is, as far as Cheltenham goes she's a talking head/writer. Not a decision maker.
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going back to the original post , i quite like lydia and in the past she has called out a few issues others would have swerved . but yesterday i thought her questioning style was over aggressive towards a man who agreed to be put in the spotlight when it was clear there were many people involved in the decisions made . i look forward to seeing her in a more relaxed role on the ' road to cheltenham ' giggling away at the slightest jokey remark ruby makes .
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I had some respect for Lydia prior to yesterday but she confirmed what I have suspected of giving women a front seat across sports opinion e.g they need to shout loudly to make a point when said point maybe needs some consideration before spouting an opinion. Lee Mottershead jumped on her bandwagon in the RP with acerbic criticism but he is hardly a reliable entity given he is closer to Lydia than he is to Mike Tyson.
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giving women a front seat across sports opinion
Nothing like a bit of generalisation is there! |
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Simply an opinion based on what I have seen paris, my wife has agreed since the world went mad prosecuting Spanish men for doing what was an everyday event in our lives!! hth
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I don't feel it's a gender/s e x thing personally, though that does gnaw away at her somewhat. In my view she sees herself as an activist journo type, rather than just passing commentary/opinion/punditry, actually being the reason/cause of change. There's no doubt she is capable and intelligent, some of her interviewing tactics are however cringe (see Andrew Balding in Sandown).
She definitely (in my opinion) thought she could engineer more severe sanctions for OM (as an example). |
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For something that happened away from the sport.
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A dreadful interview,let’s see if she will have the same approach with some of the big names in the game….
She was showing off,easy pickings….. |
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More importantly why didn’t she corner Dan Skeleton in the same manner regarding Grey Dawning ?
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Did she not give Nicky Henderson a grilling a couple of years ago
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Just one Jim…..
Would she chin Johnny G in this manner ? |
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Maybe ITV thought she would bring too much attention…..
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I don’t see why she wouldn’t
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I assume everyone expressing the opinion it was too dark to race wrre actually on-course because having been there it wasn't too dark and I'm sure on foggy/rainstorm days it's been worse visibly
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Hereford yesterday was pretty dark…
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I was on course isleham and don’t have an issue with the light,but
regarding the safety of horses I felt it was an unnecessary gamble I realise every time a horse runs there’s a danger as with anything in life . |
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When the tape goes up or the gates go clang it’s spells danger on any track…..
Can any caring punter tell me what moderate horse died on track a fortnight ago….without google…..? |
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That's right, having horse welfare as your chief consideration is incompatible with being a proponent of jump racing. It is brutal and it's guaranteed that horses participating will be killed.
That doesn't mean that people directly involved don't care. 99% of them do. But they are still comfortable with the sacrifice as it's overall beneficial to them. To portray yourself as holding horse welfare as the utmost priority is simply hypocritical, or else you'd be calling for no jumps racing at all. It's just a version of virtue signalling where you try and cultivate a position/profile of really caring, and that horses are your top priority. Well, no, they actually aren't, are they. |
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Hypocrisy in horse racing Cider……it’s steeped since day one……I remember punters walking away when Alverton died…..
They are still punting and following….. Best to keep a lid on… |
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Painting obstacles white and hollowing out races. It's just a mirage really. Either you consider horses are expendable, and the benefits of jump racing outweigh sacrificing them on the track, or they don't. Once you are comfortable with the acceptance that the sacrifice is worth it, the 1/100 risk of finding two holes on the same track at the same time is put into some perspective.
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So the 95% (guessestimate) of horses that would never have lived is the sacrifice that is acceptable as the alternative?
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That's the argument/divide, however you want to couch it. Either you think that it's worth it to breed horses for sport, when a significant percentage will die early in the pursuit bof it, or you don't. If you are an advocate of, and derive your income directly from said sport, By default I'd say that puts you in the camp that does feel it is acceptable. I don't think you can have cakeism where you think the risk is elevated too high in one particular incident, but accept the material risk of daily jumps racing, knowing that horses will die doing it on the track. Hole, or no hole.
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A simple analogy is driving or riding in the car. Around 2000 people will die doing that every year in the UK. Nearly every one of us accepts that risk. As the benefits outweigh not using cars, even though there is a guaranteed attrition rate. So would you ban using cars due to poor weather conditions, and the risk is guaranteed to be elevated? Most people will still choose to drive in riskier conditions. But nobody has to. Perhaps you could get the transport minister on and berate them for allowing the motorway to be open in freezing conditions even though nobody crashed!
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1/ Hislop did not have to be that aggressive in her interview. The media's job is primarily to report and not comment. After all, the jocks, trainers and stewards were happy to go ahead - yet Hislop thought she knew better than they did!
2/ Typical British Racing f*ck up though. Why were not the horses sent to post while the bit of ground was railed off? Worse that could have happened was that the railing off did not work and the horses would have had a canter to post for nothing. Cannot see any issue with that. By doing what I have suggested, the race would have been off around 7 to 8 minutes earlier and before the light went. 3/ It really is about time that tracks put a spotlight on the winning post which shines across the finish line to assist with photo-finishes in poor light. This works at floodlit meetings. Of course, the racing tech people are apparently considering cameras with advanced resolution. Good stuff but the BHA take forever to introduce new stuff so let us have some simple spotlights for the time being, eh? |
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The light/fading light is a much more pertinent discussion. As that is not a one off scenario.
One assumes that they wanted to make sure that they got the go ahead before mounting and going to the start. Which is understandable. There are multiple aspects to the light aren't there. For example, if a horse falls and the jockey is knocked out 'in the country', it would be problematic for the medics. What if a horse gets loose 'in the dark'. Attending to a stricken horse. The technical equipment functionality as well. As I noted above, that is something that could easily be standardised, and have a threshold for light, if falling below the threshold you can't race. Period. |
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Possibly was a bit aggressive the knight but was very courteous at the end of the interview.
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the 1/100 risk of finding two holes on the same track at the same time is put into some perspective.
If you were offering 100/1 another hole somewhere on the track immediately after the first one was found I reckon you'd have seen plenty of business, taking the view that if it was a drain issue and presuming the whole system is linked under the ground, 100/1 about another collapse somewhere would have been more than fair. |
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Cider 27 Jan 26 12:43
A simple analogy is driving or riding in the car. Around 2000 people will die doing that every year in the UK. Nearly every one of us accepts that risk. As the benefits outweigh not using cars, even though there is a guaranteed attrition rate. So would you ban using cars due to poor weather conditions, and the risk is guaranteed to be elevated? Most people will still choose to drive in riskier conditions. But nobody has to. Perhaps you could get the transport minister on and berate them for allowing the motorway to be open in freezing conditions even though nobody crashed! But the least drivers can expect is that those responsible for maintaining the roads ensure they are in good and safe condition to drive on eg pot holes (!) dealt with quickly, roads gritted in icy conditions. Of course we still drive when we know pot holes and / or ice are a risk, but on a racecourse, whilst we know a small percentage of horses will die, the very minimum should be that the surface is not a risk to them, as that is within our control. |
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Indeed George it the least we can do.
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That's what people on the ground determined GB. That the course was safe to race. It's some people who weren't looking at the conditions and had no responsibility or accountability that are moaning. Lydia wants the people who put their necks on the line (literally) to be cut out of the decision making.
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If she is a champagne socialist (I have no idea if she is or not, no idea of her personal politics), it wouldn't be too surprising. The proles clearly aren't intelligent enough and are too biased to look beyond the incentive of cash, so let's leave it to the 'clever' people who haven't been within 5 yards of a racehorse.
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