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Racing does not need jumps, it’s called flat racing.
tbh I find it a pathetic arguement for anyone to make anyway, David.
The soft safe whip is just that – soft and safe.
Something that is so intrinsic to Jump racing (the jumps) brings about injury and death to so many animals.
Why is it that in your eyes needing jumps in order for jump racing to exist is somehow an excuse to exist? In the eyes of the general public your excuse will just mean there’s even more reason to ban jump racing.
Value Is EverythingConstantly amazed at your ignorance, Cormack. Your points have been shredded and you’ve been made to look rather silly on this thread.
Going walkabout for a few weeks and returning when there’s a news story doesn’t make your viewpoint any more valid that it was before.
Shredded? You think LS? What a thoroughly unsavoury post. Good to see you are still tuning in though.
I just think racing doesn’t need the whip to be an engaging and interesting sport. And it can disarm a large contingent of its detractors by doing away with it completely. I’m very aware of its softness and safeness. But I am also aware of its impact on people who perceive it (understandably) as cruel. I don’t think it is cruel but it is hard to justify the hitting of an animal is it not? We won’t be able to strike animals for sport for much longer, much better to be on the front foot, in my opinion.
Yes, jumps racing will come under scrutiny, it already is. I’ve outlined what I think are the key differences in various posts on here many times.
Oh no, not another thread about the use of the whip, this subject has been flogged to death.
Can you imagine what would have happened if the BHA and heath and safely were about during Roman time, Judah Ben Hur would have been called before the stewards for overuse of the whip and dangerous riding, and given a thousand-year ban.
Mike.
The story is also the lead on The Guardian’s racing page from which I paste my comment:
Nick Rust has left it too late. For what seems like years I’ve been advocating a quiet, voluntary withdrawal of the whip by the BHA. It needn’t have been on welfare grounds. They could simply have said, ‘We respect and value public perception and public opinion and it is on those grounds alone we have decided to allow whip use for safety only.’
I know that would enrage whip stalwarts, and I understand why. And I have plenty sympathy too with their point of view. But it’s long been obvious that it isn’t about us anymore. A whip ban was always going to be a matter of time. Now, we have left it too late. It will be imposed on us and the huge danger (which has always been there) is that campaigners will move on to look at other aspects, especially NH racing.
The whip was the brightest and fiercest of beacons for the antis. It could be seen in use every day on almost every horse in every race. If we had doused that beacon voluntarily, their path toward attacking NH racing would have been much darker and an awful lot more difficult to navigate.
The Whip was always going to be only campaigners first target before going on to NH Racing.
The idea that campaigners would’ve stopped at the whip had Racing got rid of it sooner… is sheer stupidity… But then again, we are talking about The Guardian and their readers.
Can you imagine those nice, reasonable, animal rights campaigners saying, “now we’ve got rid of the soft safe whip we won’t bother with the hard, injury making, killer obstacles – you can keep them”?
Value Is EverythingAnd it can disarm a large contingent of its detractors by doing away with it completely. I’m very aware of its softness and safeness. But I am also aware of its impact on people who perceive it (understandably) as cruel. I don’t think it is cruel but it is hard to justify the hitting of an animal is it not? We won’t be able to strike animals for sport for much longer, much better to be on the front foot, in my opinion.
To pander to these people, will lead to the end of racing. Do you think these people like to see horses jump fences and potentially fall and be injured? No, do we as racing fans? No. However, we have to accept with all sports there is the potential for injuries to happen.
I have seen it mentioned that we are blocking the potential for more fans to enter the sport due to the whip. Are these fans that don’t like the whip, happy with the potential injuries/fatalities? Probably not.
We will end up going round in circles, and the game will be over due to the sport being overly soft.
Twitter: Jackh1092
Hindsight is 20/20 so make the most of it!Whatever about the rights and wrongs of banning the whip, I don’t think much of Kevin Blake’s argument- parroted almost verbatim by Declan Rix at the weekend- that it’s important to select for horses with an easily triggered fight or flight response. I take it neither of them have ever ridden a spooky horse on the road. It’s annoying at best, dangerous at worst. I wonder how many of those “freak accidents” at home are due to easily startled horses rather than the more phlegmatic characters.
The “fight” response being part of it, these horses may also be the type to kick first and think later when startled. I’ve seen a vet get double barrelled very hard with no warning (hospitalised for a couple of weeks), I know a whipper in who got quite serious head injuries when a horse was working with got him in the face, and a really good young horseman from my home town died from a kick to the chest by a horse he was lungeing.
So if you think an easily induced fight or flight response is great…be careful what you wish for.
Another howler in the almost daily stream of PR disasters for the Racing Post as the increasingly biased anti-whip paper is forced to print a sheepish apology in today’s edition.
Having led the website and print edition yesterday with a scoop about trainer Jonny Portman supposedly calling for the whip to be removed “for encouragement purposes”, they’ve been forced to print a full retraction today:
CORRECTION
The Racing Post misrepresented Jonathan Portman in a headline in yesterday’s paper, in which we claimed the trainer was calling for a whip ban. The Racing Post is happy to acknowledge this is not the case.
Surely the biased and incompetent Tom Kerr’s resignation must follow. It seemed impossible to lower the bar much further after Bruce Millington’s tenure as editor, but Kerr seems completely out of his depth. How can a sport’s little industry newspaper manage to shock, appal and offend almost every day of the week?
Also bizarre to see Cormack (again mistakenly using TheRacingForum’s Twitter account rather than his own personal one)…will he ever grasp social media?) inexplicably defending the Racing Post after this. One suspects the anti-whip ‘movement’ will never gain any traction with these shambling characters at the helm.
If we are worried that much by public perception I’d suggest scrapping the Grand National
Its the only race a lot of the public think exists and apparently the whole nation bet on it.
I’ve never heard the week after from those with winning tickets that racing is cruel it comes from those with losing tickets I’d imaging.Charles Darwin to conquer the World
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