- This topic has 74 replies, 28 voices, and was last updated 14 years, 6 months ago by
.
-
Posts
-
Just been listening to David Pipe on C4.
The flag means miss out the hurdle. It should be waved along with markers in front of the hurdle. Why was it waved!!! Where were the markers.
This is quite clearly a problem with the clerk of the course. Someone told the guy with the flag to get it out.
I say the jockey was right.
The race should be declared void and bets refunded.
I have NO financial interest in that race.
Not good unless other bookmakers have refunded.
I’d write/contact the Stewards at Newton Abbott and ask them to explain their decision.
Just been listening to David Pipe on C4.
The flag means miss out the hurdle. It should be waved along with markers in front of the hurdle. Why was it waved!!! Where were the markers.
This is quite clearly a problem with the clerk of the course. Someone told the guy with the flag to get it out.
I say the jockey was right.
The salient points from the
Post
report suggest the course officials may have already made their minds up;
A clearly shaken Cook said: "There was a flagman waving a big flag at the point of the incident and shouting at us to go round the hurdle. I could have jumped it if he had not been there."
Tabaran’s rider Dayman added: "I could see the flagman and there were people shouting but the hurdle was not dolled off. I made a split-second decision to jump the hurdle as a result and I suppose I have been proved right."
Stewards’ secretary Colin Vickers said: “As this is Cook’s second offence in the past 12 months he is automatically referred to the BHA.
“However, stewards found there was no wrongdoing by any members of the course groundstaff in the incident.”
The vilification of Danny Cook over this incident is unfortunate. Inasmuch as Cook is a / the weapon of choice for a number of trainers who want a rider well capable of perfectly-executed front-running ride (he made his initial forays under Rules doing just that, repeatedly, for the likes of Barry Leavy and John Stimpson), so it behoves him to make himself arguably even more familiar with the racetrack than any other jockey. In any such race it follows that he is likely to come to most parts (and hopefully for connections, every part) of the racecourse before his rivals.
On that basis the Cheltenham brainstorm on Our Vic was hard to mitigate against, as the jockey himself was ready to admit. The Newton Abbot race last night was a definite matter entirely, though – there was visual and verbal input from a third party that at the very least was not helpful to the rider, and at the worst contradictory.
If Pipe jnr’s interpretation of the flag rules is correct (as I believe it is), and Cook’s assertion that the flagperson barked the wrong advice at him is honest, there are tentative grounds for appeal against any ban if nothing else. Success, however, would presumably hinge on the former’s word against the other, with the likes of Ollie Dayman on the winner having no vested interest in admitting that he chose to ignore the flagperson’s instructions to omit the hurdle.
I await subsequent developments with interest.
The suggestions of lengthy bans from some of the more excitable contributors to this thread are not especially helpful, and the abuse directed at the rider all the less so. It’s an enduring source of irritation that the taking of the wrong course, dropping of hands close home, and other offences in which no harm is done either to horse or rider, all seem to attract calls for (and tend to get) longer bans than offences of persisting on tired or beaten horses do. John Mathias’s forcing on of Karashar at Sedgefield last Monday with fatal consequences was a rather more injudicious piece of horsemanship than Cook’s, I’d suggest.
gc
Adoptive father of two. The patron saint of lower-grade fare. A gently critical friend of point-to-pointing. Kindness is a political act.
Well said! Especially:
John Mathias’s forcing on of Karashar at Sedgefield last Monday with fatal consequences was a rather more injudicious piece of horsemanship than Cook’s, I’d suggest.
- Total Posts 17716
Opinions aside – the fact remains Cook has taken the wrong course 3 times in 1 year….
Should a jockey be allowed to race with 3 offences within 1 year????
Its not opinion its fact, 3 times in 1 year. Not good enough
Once is bad, twice is dreadfull, three times and your out.
Perhaps he needs to go back to basics, retraining course, I dont know, but 3 times in 1 year is not acceptable..
- Total Posts 17716
Pipe’s website reports: "The horse was bright and well this morning and had eaten up so will take his chance in the 1.10pm race at Market Rasen. We do have a jockey change however, Rhys Flint will replace Danny Cook in the saddle."
Tells you all you need to know…
The waving of a flag should mean that evasive action of some sort should be taken. Why would anyone assume in a split second that someone would wave a flag to tell you to carry on as if nothing had happened? I would imagine that Danny Cook isn’t riding today because his confidence has been knocked because of the incident and The Pipes also want to protect him. I hope everyone involved looks hard and fast at what happened yesterday, and it’s done honestly without people covering their own backs. And I’m pretty sure that if Danny feels that he is 100% at fault he will be the first to hold up his hands and admit to it, and take whatever punishment is given.
- Total Posts 17716
To protect him????? I think the best thing he could do is ride today and face up to the public, not hide away…
He was heckled yesterday in the parade ring and rightly so. When your in the public eye in sport you must be prepared to accept these things. They are only words, they cant hurt you!!!!!
At the end of the day, he has taken the wrong course 3 times in 1 year, we all know he thought he was doing the right thing yesterday, nobody questions that, but 3 times in 1 year suggests he needs to go back to basics, whatever the reasoning behind each incident…
Its just not good enough. Personally I do feel sorry for the lad obviously we all do, but he is an adult and this is his profession, and he must be punished accordingly.
Although I dont bet on horses we must remember that the punter essentially funds this great sport of ours, and as such there should be a responsibility to ensure they recieve the best quality of race riding from jockeys that is possible, they shouldn’t have to put up with instances like this.
Anyone who backed Gaspara I feel is entitled to call for a lengthy ban for the lad..
How come all the people calling for Danny Cook to get a lengthy ban aren’t calling for the flagman who was waving the flag to get sacked? I mean, what exactly was he doing there? Would Cook have missed the hurdle if he wasn’t there?
Taking the wrong course 3 times in a year is terrible, but I think last night was excusable under the circumstances.- Total Posts 17716
Well the BHA have already come out to say there was no wrong doing from the flagmen… Although you have to wonder….
Mouse of Men nearly did a Danny Cook at the last there!!!
- Total Posts 17716
Again, why did no other jockeys swerve the hurdle? Stop making excuses for him. He was the leader and decided to swerve the hurdle, yet nobody followed him. His fault 100%.
One other did: watch the video. Of course this other jockey later claimed to have "pulled up", but that’s at least debatable. It certainly does look like a confusing, grey-area situation, one to put down to bad luck rather than sheer jockey idiocy. You could see Cook hesitate uncertain of what to do: he says that his mind was made up when somebody waving a flag instructed him to "go round" – of course "go round" what? is another question.
Righteous indignation is clearly out of place, as it usually is.
- Total Posts 17716
Anyone who backed Gaspara I feel is entitled to call for a lengthy ban for the lad..
Anyone who backed Gaspara is hardly in a position to be
objective
about the incident, wouldn’t you agree?
That’s rather like asking my lunchtime salmon to condemn me to death for eating it. On second thoughts…
- Total Posts 17716
Well in fairness you could argue then the tax payer has no right to give out about the government…
The punters fund the sport,in a roundabout way they pay jockey wages, do they not have more right then me (doesnt back horses) to voice their anger?
Maybe your right I dunno, I just think anyone who backed it has a strong right to call for a ban
Pipe’s website reports: "The horse was bright and well this morning and had eaten up so will take his chance in the 1.10pm race at Market Rasen. We do have a jockey change however, Rhys Flint will replace Danny Cook in the saddle."
Tells you all you need to know…
…other than the strong possibility that Dave Roberts negotiated for the already Market Rasen-bound Rhys Flint to snaffle the ride to help seal the conditional riders’ championship.
Danny Cook had no other rides on the card and little to play for on the afternoon other than professional pride, whereas Flint had three other rides and a title to win.
David Pipe didn’t have that writ large on his website by way of an explanation, but then he doesn’t owe any of us one.
As I’m sure has been mentioned elsewhere in the thread already, Cook did ride Brandy Butter to victory in the selling hurdle at Newton Abbot last night, a 51st career victory under Rules to set alongside other gains in point-to-points.
The fact that Pipe did not jock Cook off the gelding despite there being nearly an hour between races, and with any number of viable alternative riders still on course but not enagaged in that seller, does, to borrow a phrase, "tell you all you need to know".
gc
Adoptive father of two. The patron saint of lower-grade fare. A gently critical friend of point-to-pointing. Kindness is a political act.
- Total Posts 17716
Cannot understand the debate here.
The lad made the same mistake 3 times in 1 year, you do that in your job, good chance you will get fired.
The amount of winners he has ridden this year or any other year should have no influence whatsoever. Every jockey is an equal when it comes to a ban
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.