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After the tragic demise of Envoi Allen today I’ve no doubt the BHA will be adding more qualification rules to the races at the Festival.
That Envoi had only run once since March of last year, admittedly a Grade 1 win over 3 miles, and was asked to run his final race before retirement as a 12 year over the longest distance he had ever encountered in a race as competitive as the Gold Cup will no doubt come under the closest scrutiny.
To be honest I was very surprised to see his name in the entries. He probably deserved a chance a few years back but leaving it until he was 12 did seem odd.
I know he was lightly raced but I do wonder if the BHA will now add in more rules (because we know they love them) regarding the amount of runs in a season or the amount of days between the horses last run and a Grade 1 at the Festival?
Those were exactly my thoughts, especially when you know that HDB is very careful when it comes to selecting a horse’s target. I just wonder if owners thought it would be a fun way to bow out at a track where he had been so successful. As already stated the Gold Cup0 mis the most demanding race by far and those extra two and a half furlongs can empty out many horses. Luckily heart attacks have become very rare nowadays, but some sort qualifying rules would be helpful.
Can’t go on number of runs in a season. Didn’t Al Boum Photo win his two after only one run?
Al Boum Photo
Penhill
Best Mate
QuevegaAre a few off the top of my head.
Actually Best Mate collapsed and died on seasonal reappeareance, over a shorter trip than his best. What to do?I hope there are no new rules. The only rule that would prevent fatalities in racing would be the “no racing at all” rule.
The risk involved in racing cannot ever be removed entirely, and continuously adding reactive rules after each sad event will eventually destroy the sport, which will in no way benefit the horses either.
He deserved to take his chance in the best of the best race. He was minded all season for this as his swan song a cruel twist of fate befell him in my view. I have no doubt whatsoever that Henry and everyone involved with the horse loved him far more than we as fans do/did. Just terrible luck. No changes required.
Agree with Marlingford and TYT. I don’t see what good some knee jerk reaction rules will do. Plenty of horses run well when fresh.
I would like to see all NH horses dismounted before they leave the racecourse and don’t see why they should have to carry their jockeys for any longer than necessary after their extraordinary exertions. Two grooms could lead the horses back to the enclosures.
Until we know what caused the horse to collapse its pointless speculating what might happen. It wasnt a fiecely run race and envoi allen stayed out the back. No easy answers im afraid.
From racecourse –
He was then looked at after the race, it is a cursory to check nothing is going wrong with any of the horses and they are allowed to come down the chute. Sadly events overtook him.
“He will have a post-mortem, that will be conducted tomorrow, he will also have a fatality test to check nothing has been given to him – I’m not suggesting any of Henry’s horses will have been, but we need to make sure there is nothing in his system that shouldn’t be there, though it is highly unlikely.
“There’ll be a fatality review process which happens every time there is a fatality on the racecourse. We will examine what has happened, but I think it is fairly straightforward.
“The post-mortem may confirm something more, but it is an acute cardiovascular collapse, almost certainly
VF x
“That Envoi had only run once since March of last year, admittedly a Grade 1 win over 3 miles”…beating the race fit Affordale Fury who won the Savills on his next run.
He didn’t have any injury problems after that, he was deliberately tucked away to avoid the deep winter ground that he disliked.
You’ve never run over further than 3 miles till you’ve done it. Abufffalosoldier tried it at 7, won, collapsed and died. Marble Sands tried it in the same race the following year at 9, won, and lived.
Many Clouds broke Thistlecrack in the Cotswold Chase, won, and died. That race probably ruled Thistlecrack out of running in the gold cup as a novice at the age of 9, a year older than Coneygree who famously ran in it and won as a novice because he was so fragile the Bradstocks didn’t know if they could keep him sound enough for another season. Three years older than the novice Gloria Victis, who fell and died in the gold cup aged 6, the same as as Long Run was when he won the gold cup- though Long Run wasn’t a novice.
That gold cup that Thistlecrack didn’t run in did have a fatality, sadly- Invitation Only, who was the nice moderate age of 8 with a win in the Thyestes- a nice moderate time gap- on his previous start. He did have some previous non completions though, and an amateur rider.
So what now?Ban everything younger than 7,older than 9, novices, amateur riders, horses that have only had one start that year, horses whose previous start was too recent or too long ago, horses who have haven’t won on the prevailing ground, horses with any letters other than BD in their recent history?
If it had been another runner in the gold cup that died – whether cardiac death or breakdown on the flat or a fatal fall- fault could be found.
Gaelic Warrior- bit of a header, too keen, 3 hard races this season, they’re greedy, should have run in the Ryanair
IKTWYT- the absolute state of his form this year, the fall last time, horrid jumping today
L’Homme Presse- too old
Gold Tweet – 100-1 tiny little French horse, came 2nd last on his only prior start over British fences, over a year agoActually the only horse not to complete was Haiti Couleurs- the one in the right age bracket, with proven stamina and jumping ability and recent winning form. Ticked all the boxes but did nowt. It’s a strange old game.
You can’t legislate for what happened to him – if something had of shown up pre-race, he would have been taken out under vets advice. This type of incident could have just as easily happened had they run him in the Ryanair or even if he was galloping around in a paddock at home.
We had Latenightpass at the age of 13 running his final race in the Cross Country Chase where he finished 5th and although beaten some 22L for a long way he ran a great race – the 2nd and 3rd in the race were both 11 years old, indeed of the 14 runners only four were under the age of 10 and only two of them finished in the first 10 home.
Unfortunately no matter how many precautions you take or checks you put in place, cardio issues can strike from out of the blue and to some of the healthiest individuals for no reason at all.
To me a far more worrying/distressing sight came about at the end of the 4:50 3m Hunter Chase at Fakenham where of the four runners only one managed to finish but he was so absolutely legless that he tried to pull himself up on the ‘run’ to the last, and I say that in the loosest terms as he was barely at walking pace coming off the home turn and by the time he eventually got to the last, he literally (in stages) climbed over/through the fence and then proceeded to walk the length of the run in pass the line.
On officially good to soft ground the overall race time was just over one minute slow!
I posted on 12th Dec that i thought it was probably a risk not worth taking so not being wise after event , however he won his last race and he passed pre race vets , but at 33 to 1 , one of those i wonder why bother
Not sure why he jumped last two fences but he could have dropped dead at end of straight walking back and jockey just jogged him home so its not on him imho
My thoughts would be , owner loaded , they have had 7 goes at Cheltenham with him , if you going to retire a horse after a race , like i said on 12th Dec , retire it before race .
If all you want is a horse home safe , dont enter it .
Overall i think Cheltenham done a very good job this week with safety .Overall i think Cheltenham done a very good job this week with safety.
Agree. Which is why it is unfair of the BBC to give the last word on its report into the incident to a spokeswoman from the League Against Cruel Sports:
“Every year horses are raced to their deaths at the Cheltenham Festival. Since the turn of the century, the shocking death toll of horses that have died at the festival has reached 82. There would be a huge outcry if this death toll happened in any other sport so we need to start prioritising horse welfare.”
Which is exactly what racing has done. No mention of how the overall fatality rate has gone down or any mention of the many different things that have been done to make the sport safer. And no recognition of risk being part of the sport, as it is part of life.
It is very sad about Envoi Allen but it was an accident. I don’t believe anyone is to blame. As mentioned above, it could have happened to him on the gallops.
I agree with LD that the incident in the last race at Fakenham yesterday was potentially far more damaging to racing’s reputation because it involved a jockey not thinking about horse welfare. If that horse had collapsed, it would have been very difficult for racing to defend.
Not that I’m advocating change at all but it’s the BHA we are talking about and they have a tendency to tinker with the rules playing a game of whack a mole as they do with the National. They like to be seen to do something even when there is little evidence to instigate change.
Saying that I still find it strange that Envoi Allen was asked to run in the Gold Cup. The biggest price he’s ever been at the Festival was 10-1 in the 2022 Champion Chase. His odds of 33-1 for the Gold Cup suggested he had little or no chance of winning and a place was the best they could hope for.
The Gold Cup can be a brutal affair with an end to end gallop which is probably why we’ve not seen any winner aged 10 or over this century. How many horses this Century have had their first attempt at it at the age of 12?
HK and OZ have mandatory retirement , I’ve seen horses at 12 in great form imho it’s not the way to go . On the flip side I was on track last year and a 3 yo filly dropped dead after 1200 metres . It’s not a exact science .We all know 500 kgs of fast animal, there’s a lot going on , and huge pressure on body but that’s what they are bred for .
My view is it seemed pointless rolling the dice again with Envoi Allen at outside odds . However Iam pretty confident the stable set him for race , and had him healthy pre race .Statistics are maintained for the number of horses dying after mishaps during races but are they also maintained for horses that collapse and die immediately post-race or soon afterwards.
If so, is there any quantifiable evidence that the number of such fatalities has increased in recent years?
The gene pool of NH horses has been increasingly impacted by Flat-breds and I speculate whether this has resulted in the population of today’s staying chasers not being as resilient to stamina tests as their more traditionally bred forbears were.
Just a thought.
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