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Well I have to say that ITV did better than I expected today; certainly way better than any previous terrestrial broadcaster. Giving the last word to Richard Hoiles was a very smart move, leaving it to the most analytical mind in the team and the person who, by virtue of being the commentator, is at some remove from the access question. Not only did he take the argument to the BHA representative, grounding his piece to camera on the 4k figure. He also emphasised the need for racing to grasp the nettle with this rather than attempt to brush it under the carpet, and to close the loopholes that allow these practices. 1m people watched that Panorama according to RH – many more than diehard racing fans. Many of them will have been ITV racing viewers. The last thing that ITV needs is to lose its audience over this – and there was, quite rightly, a sombre transition from this (the serious business) to the racing. Quite how they take the issues forward I don’t know, but I hope they are giving this some thought. Immediate thoughts that I have that would feed into programme content: 1) promote after-care welfare in their broadcasts even more as a routine feature. This would be to go beyond the one-off [insert famous name] ‘where are they now’ 30 second video clip, or Greatwood Day feature. Done seriously this could work to aid and support the work of the re-homing/re-training charities, through increasing donations and gifts; 2) follow a small selection of horses through that process, so more people come to realise the challenges and the diversity of post racing roles; 3) And in a rather more investigative style, keep following that Frankel foal from 2017 … Indigo Lake, left Clarehaven at the end of 2020, sold as part of the Juddmonte consignment at the HiT Sales for 95k; now gelded, had wind surgery, and according to the RP now with the Newland yard, with his last run being 5/8 in a maiden hurdle at Market Rasen back in February.
https://www.tattersalls.com/search-results?criterion=Indigo+Lake
@Cancello@Marlingford – I agree. It will be interesting to see what ITV has to say tomorrow. Fwiw, I think they have a unique opportunity. Their pitch has been to widen racing’s public and part of that has been the much welcomed one of taking welfare issues seriously – equine and human. This issue goes to the heart of both, and it brings those concerns together. Imagine being the stable staff who had cared for those named horses. Distraught does not begin to get anywhere near it. It is bad enough when they are wrenched from your care, through fatalities or when they change yards, are sold etc. It’s bad enough when you don’t know what’s happened to them. But when you’re presented with this – well, it must be your worst fears and more. I know I would be in bits if I’d cared for VdR.
My other thought is re possible regulatory interventions. As a breeder (in my case, of cats – now no more, since they are all neutered!), I routinely used to put on the bottom of each pedigree of any kitten I sold, ‘Should this cat ever have to be re-homed, please contact me first – phone number’. I was only ever a small breeder, but I had occasion to be involved once in such a re-homing, on account of a partnership breaking down. The kitten came back, and was then re-homed. I didn’t think twice about it: it was the breed club policy and it is what all responsible breeders did. I wonder why the same policy could not be instigated in relation to stud farms by the racing regulators? After all, there isn’t even the problem of space and worries over what the resident pets might think here – they have oodles of paddock space. Or, on second thoughts – perhaps that is just the problem. Some of these studs are churning out such huge numbers each year that even their vast acres don’t have the capacity to hold them.
The issues with this programme are not just with what it revealed but with what it brought into view about this industry – much of which has been suppressed (and storied alternatively) by multiple stakeholders over decades, for obvious reasons. It’s not just a racing problem; it’s a breeding problem and at the heart of that is an over-supply problem. One only has to look at the clearance rate at the sales (flat and stores) to see that, and even that is a highly massaged figure – see the thread from ages back about sales practices.
My issue is that it has taken this programme to put this laissez faire world into the spotlight. An even bigger issue I have is that, after all this, this is still a world that many in the industry would clearly like to wish away – witness the conspicuous silence of many, whilst others show that they have a moral compass.
The 4k list will, potentially, hold a lot of information. I strongly suspect that it will indicate the various levels of ‘wastage’ that occur across the industry. But just how much information does an abattoir hold about those it destroys, and for how long? I don’t know the answer to that – but, as grass says, there’s a microchip in each horse which will have to be removed prior to its entering the meat chain and which is the unique identifier for each horse. What I would want to know minimum is the age and sex distribution of that 4k – then we’d have a pretty clear idea of the proportions from each part of the industry (studs, sales yards, point yards, pre-training yards, and racing yards, flat v NH). Racing yards are just the visible part of this whole iceberg.
At least one new regulatory development – the e-passport for each foal that reaches 30 days – will make it easier for regulators to connect horses to ownership, at all levels of the tb business.
Bailey’s Blog was my first port of call this morning – and I was not surprised by the reaction there. His is a relatively small yard, where responsibilities for after care are taken as seriously as they should be by all who are involved in this sport – as his blog and website make abundantly clear. Even so, the interview gives an indication of the scale of the rehoming that needs to occur – 20 this summer alone from a yard with ~50-60 in training. That starts to point to the huge problem that confronts re-homing from the bigger yards, and at scale at the level of racing jurisdictions. Today’s press releases have carried figures into the 3k for horses now registered as ex racehorses by welfare organisations in GB. That’s a huge improvement on where things were, yes. But most of these are going to be ‘forever homes’ and many retired horses will live well into their 20s. So, if 7k are estimated to leave racing each year, that’s an ever expanding number of homes that are going to be needed … it’s an issue that goes to the heart of over-production.
For those wondering about how ex race horses from Ireland end up in the likes of Drury’s, my sense is that one aspect of this is that the horse is regarded as primarily an agricultural commodity in Ireland, whereas in GB its seen as a commodity within the leisure/entertainment business – which is not the same thing as a pet . For me this explains the onus of responsibility that several trainers based in England have articulated today; the one that comes with owning an animal whose purpose is to give its owners (and connections) pleasurable days out at the races. It also explains why horses end up at an abattoir – which is the first port of call in meat production.
In circumstances where a horse is seen as an agricultural commodity and when it is no longer seen as of racing value then the horse reverts to its agricultural value. In simple economic terms, if you euthanise an animal you pay the veterinary fees and disposal costs. When the horse goes to an abattoir what’s being realised is its residual value, as meat. So, the abattoir pays you (or – more likely – the consignor of the load on the horse box, who will have paid you). The more you off-load, the more you get. Now, what the abattoir pays will depend on which meat production plants it supplies. Obviously, there are markets in continental Europe for horsemeat, and there are meat plants that prepare horsemeat to sell into wholesale and retail markets. But some meat production plants are not quite as above board as others. They are sites where meat get mixed. Think mince. As the Horse-gate scandal of a few years ago showed, the endless pressure by supermarkets and consumers for cheaper and cheaper processed food carries with it strong incentives to mix cheaper sources of meat (horse) with more expensive sources (beef) and to pass off one as the other in highly processed products. Racing may live in a bubble – but this is the world to which its primary commodity, the horse, is all too easily connected. It’s why after care matters so much and why there is not the gap between that abattoir and the industry that some maintain.
I could not bring myself to watch it. It was enough to listen to the feature report on R4 PM (not known for its sensationalism), where the illegality of the methods of despatch were also addressed. Along with the drugs issue, this is beyond ‘not a good look’ for horse racing and its governing bodies. It goes to the very heart of the industry and its social licence. The ‘dark side’ to horse racing (and breeding) in the UK and Ireland has long been visible to those who want to look at and think about the numbers. An 8k foal crop; stallions covering 150-300 mares per year; the high turnover in the big yards; the non-existent breeding future for all those NH stores; the inability of rehabilitation/retraining charities to cope with anything other than tiny numbers. Then add to that the demand for horse meat in parts of Europe – think the investigative journalism of a few years ago, in which it was shown that horse meat is substituted for (the more expensive) beef in products destined for human consumption. It is obvious that the feel good, ‘where are they now’ stories shown to the masses on ITV apply only the lucky few, and are just that – feel good window dressing stories, deflecting attention from where it needs to be. Instead, over production, the high ‘wastage’ rate (whether that be the result of lack of ability, or injury) and insurance payouts for owners ensure that the majority (especially not good enough colts and geldings) are on a rapid conveyor belt to the slaughter house.
Quite right @befair. I haven’t read that one – but would note the potential overlap in interests between The Times and Team Sky. That is difficult terrain for any embedded journalist to navigate. Subsequent events have shown just what was going on and I suspect we will see much the same emerge in racing, especially around TUEs. Whatever, Walsh’s interest in this story represents a new journalistic departure and a welcome change from what passes for a racing press. To my mind, that the racing press has long behaved like the proverbial ostriches and the sand over this one speaks volumes – where are the equivalents of William Fotheringham or Sean Ingle? Nowhere to be seen.
David Walsh is one of the leading investigative sports writers/journalists in the UK. For those who might not be aware, he is the sports writer who first broke the Lance Armstrong story, and his book on the Russian state-sponsored doping programme has just been published. My reading of this story’s appearance today is that it is a marker of interest. For sure, papers need ‘click bait’, but serious writers don’t publish unless they, their editors, and – as significantly – their lawyers, are convinced the story is worth pursuing. Finally, seemingly, this issue is going to get the treatment it merits. I cannot see it being otherwise, given Walsh’s steadfast pursuit, over decades, of drugs in elite sport. Like others on this thread, I sincerely hope this is racing’s Festina moment.
https://www.waterstones.com/book/the-russian-affair/david-walsh/9781471158155
https://www.waterstones.com/book/seven-deadly-sins/david-walsh/9781471127557I have ordered my copy – hopefully it will be dispatched ahead of any interventions seeking to suppress its circulation.
Genuinely, I think we are now at a tipping point with this issue. It is not just this book, but its publication’s coincidence with the JB statements and the on-going legal case in the US, where the level of documentation being amassed seems to have pushed the trial date well back into 2021. For those interested in this, regular updates appear in the TDN US edition. As someone who also follows athletics and cycling, the parallels with what is going on in horse racing are considerable; even the drugs overlap – not surprisingly, given what racehorses are asked to do. With this level of discussion ‘out there’ and the omerta code seemingly broken, we are now at the point where it is surely not a case of whether WADA gets involved, but when. At that point, no one is too big – just look at what has happened to the Russian Athletics Federation, to Salazar’s Project Oregon, and to Team Sky. Personally, I would like to see retrospective testing of samples, as per in athletics, where the litany of abuse, going back to 2007/8, has resulted in the reallocation of medals at major championships.
I have just read the modelling paper that underpins yesterday’s shift in UK government policy. It makes very clear that the suppression measures are in place for 5 months minimum, though to the end of August. That’s what Whitty and Vallence mean when they are saying ‘months’ and so that would seem to put paid to much of the flat season. The paper suggests there may be a relaxation in September (coinciding with the new school year?), but – in the absence of any vaccine – an ‘on/off’ switch, determined by the number of Covid-19 cases in IC beds, will trigger the resumption of the suppression measures in the autumn/winter. So I am not even optimistic about a resumption of the jumps proper until 2021. All told this is long haul, very long haul – 18 months I think, unless it turns out that the Chinese experience shows that drastic suppression works.
One of the most insightful pieces I have come across in relation to this (well worth the read) –
Greg Wood’s latest piece in The Guardian is the only example that I have come across of a racing journalist prepared to write about this – chapeau! Its content, however, provides confirmation of the collective within-industry wish to ‘turn the blind eye’ – and of the responses of those within the industry to journalists who do start asking the right questions.
But for how long can the industry persist with such a response? Debate about racing and horse welfare (viz. the recent A Life Well Lived report) is now framed in terms of a social licence. It focuses attention on the integrity of the sport with respect to the welfare of the horse. With this judgement the integrity spotlight is turned firmly to racing’s capacity and willingness to govern its human participants, and to the standards that the rest of society recognises as appropriate. For economic reasons racing might want to turn the blind eye. The key question may yet be can it afford to socially?
Re the novice chase problem – in recognition of this, there was a fairly major review conducted by a BHA working group, including Hobbs, Lavelle, Alexander, back in 2017. It had a number of recommendations that were broadly welcomed by many trainers, notably the one that stopped horses placed in a class 2 and below receiving a hefty hike in their handicap mark for their efforts.
https://www.britishhorseracing.com/press_releases/clear-progression-pathways-greater-incentives-run-form-core-recommendations-novices-chases-review/Whether this has actually resulted in an increase in the numbers running In these races is a moot point.
My sense is that it is the novice handicap chases (nowhere to be seen in 1990 I think) that are the most competitive element of the current novice chasing programme, certainly in terms of numbers. The primary target for many here is the race on the first day of Cheltenham (currently the Close Brothers), where the upper ceiling is now 145, and the lowest to get in last year, I think, 138/9. A look at last year’s winner’s current rating (RPR 170) gives an indication of what level of ability is being held to under 145, just to get into this race – the aim being to win a race at the Festival, rather than run with merit but not reach the frame in the “JLT”.My other observation on this week’s card and how it differs from ‘back in the day’ is the advent of the Mares’ Novice Hurdle as a race category … no doubt you will have words to say later on this one @ ap. But, just as there has been a Mares’ Novice Hurdle to accompany the Mares’ Hurdle at the Festival, then surely the precedent is there for a Mares’ Novice Chase to follow on from the new Mares’ Chase set for 2021?
@ green – I’m not so sure it can be that bad re his withers, as the BHA vet was sent to 7B last week during Peak Kerfuffle and stated that the horse was fit to run. Surely that would not have been the case if he had this condition. They surely could not have disguised that?
I tend to agree though over whether he makes it to the QMCC. All the prevarication, to me, is about wanting to find an easy (graded) race for the horse, where he can boss the field and come home miles ahead in a hack canter. Interestingly, post Tingle Creek, NJH said ‘they knew where they were’ with the 2m division – presumably on the basis of where the 11/12 year old UDS finished in relation to Defi. Now, with the horse only being entered in the QMCC, and supposedly going back to the 2m route, the obvious G1 ahead of that – the Clarence House – and with the same chief opponents in it – is being avoided in favour of the G2 Game Spirit… But what if something else turns up entered in that? Trainers are no longer going to be thinking, ‘Oh not to bother, Altior’s in that’. On current form, it’s not hard to envisage that race being avoided too. And then how attractive will taking on Chacun, Cyrname etc seem? Especially without race fitness .
One of the sad things, I think, about this whole sorry state of affairs is that it is Altior’s reputation that is the collateral damage. As @ap described it, he has become the pantomime horse. Maybe he will bounce back and restore it. Let’s hope so. But one interpretation of all the prevarication is that the trainer has his doubts. It’s as if he fears another hard race (and possible defeat) will mean the end for the horse on the race course. That, interestingly, is not the course the same yard took with Sprinter, who was beaten on three occasions before coming back. Instead, the horse I keep thinking of as an obvious parallel is, of course, Nijinsky – a peerless horse in his pomp, until he got stretched in the Leger post ringworm, and then lost the Arc, and then was a shadow of the horse he once was in the Champion Stakes. There is discussion on another thread about whether horses know they’ve won. What this raises is what happens when horses accustomed to being, and wanting to be, the leader of the herd (the winner, in our terms) lose that status. Some of them, like Dessie, ‘get their coats off’ (to use the Elsworth phrase) and fight. Others, like Nijinsky, fold. Maybe the fear is that Altior has done just that?
@ ap – re Wincanton, indeed. Thanks to these posts and the delving they have inspired, I have finally cottoned on to why the NH horses I enjoy watching the most (top quality chasers) are to be found racing consistently and exclusively at the same tracks.
When you start looking at the distribution of graded races across the JCR portfolio of tracks, you see just how much they have concentrated the quality chases into Cheltenham, Sandown and Aintree, and then Ascot and Kempton. Chasing the market, I presume, in that, with the exception of Cheltenham, these are the courses closest to the most densely populated parts of England. But whilst that strategy may work in relation to the flat, I do wonder whether NH racing (outside of Cheltenham) appeals in the same way. Some of the other JCR tracks (like Warwick and Wincanton) get their token graded race a year, or a couple if they are lucky – but these are more likely to be hurdles than chases. So, yes, races have been moved to strengthen the core offer at the Tier 1 JCR tracks, leaving the remainder with much more ‘bread and butter’ fare.
When you look at the NH pattern beyond JCR tracks then it is slim pickings indeed, and skewed to juvenile/novice hurdles and novice chases – though Charlie Hall day at Wetherby and Ayr’s April meeting are exceptions. Funny you mention the Dipper. Newcastle is my local track, and I went to that ‘Dipper meeting’ in the early 2000s, specifically to see Barton, trained in the North by the Easterby’s. He was an impressive horse – an example of the sort of animal that used to be trained up in these parts not that long ago. That was the day he came back in to the winners with a nasty cut on, I think, his off fore. Nowadays though the only graded jumps action at the track is the Fighting Fifth – a sign of the times.
I look forward to the long list – no doubt that is linked to the rise of ‘the Saturday horse’. That is another example of how marketing has changed the sport.
Another informative and thought provoking instalment @ap –thanks for the good read.
You have certainly got me thinking about the effects of the jump racing pattern – this time in relation to the sorts of horses that are to be seen at particular courses. Back in the day, Dessie was an annual standing dish at Wincanton – look back at his race record and pretty much every year one could see this outstanding chaser there doing what he did best. And he didn’t always win. Nowadays, the only time you’ll see a G1 winning chaser at Wincanton is when they’re paraded in the paddock. I guess, if you’re lucky, there might be a future one on display in the Grade 2 Novices’ chase (See More Business, Silviniaco Conti and Frodon are past winners) – but that is the only graded race over fences currently staged at Wincanton, where the ‘big’ chases are all staying handicaps. That seems a loss. But how has this happened?
An effect of the jumps pattern is that it ensures that the top quality established chasers appear at only a handful of (Jockey Club) tracks – Cheltenham, Sandown, Ascot and Kempton, plus the once a year outing at Haydock for the 3-milers. The immediate losers here are NH fans living away from London and the SE, near these other tracks, like Wincanton – or Wetherby, as others have mentioned. In the longer term, though, I wonder if the concentration of quality at a small number of courses is also part of the explanation for the general demise of NH racing in the North? The lack of races in the North for established top quality jumps horses must mean that any owner/s in the lucky situation of having such a quality horse would face what are presumably considerable transportation/over-night costs just to get their horse to the races. Why incur that additional cost when there are plenty of other options further South?
Excellent post AP – I thoroughly enjoyed reading that and look forward to future instalments.
Just one of the good things about the time frame of 1990 compared to 2020 is that it shows the effect of the NH pattern, which came in (according to Wikipedia) in 1989. The Mildmay/Cazalet (the race highlighted by AP) was one of the casualties. So too were others. They include races like the Gainsborough (later Agfa), which my namesake lumped 12 stone round to win back in 1971. I was a horse mad kid at the time, and totally in awe of this strapping bay chaser with a highly distinctive white blaze and low head carriage. Titus (who, for good measure, also won a King George, a Whitbread and a Massey Ferguson) was followed by the magnificent Crisp the next year (also carrying 12 stone), and other legends like Bula, Diamond Edge, Burrough Hill Lad (a 3 times winner) and, of course, Dessie, who won it twice (1989 and 1991), both times carrying 12 stone. Beyond 1991 its roll of honour comprises good handicappers. The Mandarin, the Racing Post, the Whitbread … it is exactly the same picture. The effect of the NH pattern has been to relegate these races to, at best, G3 handicap chases and, simultaneously, to create a clear programme of G1 and G2 races for the top horses.
In the process, I think, NH racing has lost something. Whilst the likes of the Mildmay, Gainsborough, Racing Post etc are often good, highly competitive races still, the absence of top horses from these races means that we have lost one of the clearest means to measure their standing in NH’s Hall of Fame. Dessie’s highest rating came not off his G1 race wins but off the back of his Racing Post Chase win. Likewise, it was the exception to the norm in current times that showed just what an exceptional staying chaser Denman was – carrying 12 stone off a rating in the 170s to win his second Hennessy. Both were benchmark performances that will live long in the memories of those who saw them. They also epitomised what many of us who love this sport admire most in the top class staying chaser. This is not just class and jumping ability but that combined with what compressed handicaps test above all else, toughness, or the guts, will and determination that is needed to give away large amounts of weight to good horses.
When I look at NH racing now, where one hard race, seemingly, is enough to ‘bottom’ many of the top horses, it’s that combination of qualities that I find in increasingly short supply.
Flat – it has to be Frankel’s 2000 Guineas and that moment when everyone realised he was 10 lengths clear. As a 2yo he had already turned in a monster performance in the Royal Lodge, but this was a Classic. I have never seen anything like it either; probably never will again. A genuine ‘WTF-is-this?’ moment.
Jumps – it can only be Sprinter Sacre. Three moments: that jump in his first novice chase at Donny that announced, ‘here is a 2-mile chaser’; the 2013 QM – that moment going down the hill when he and the defending champ, Sizing Europe started to really motor, and then we saw ‘a steeplechaser from the Gods!’ come home alone to get that 190+ rating (the best performance by a jumps horse that I have seen); and, of course, the 2016 Champion Chase, from the third last, when the whole of NH racing completely lost it. Jumps horse of the decade, without a question – and, for me, the best two mile chaser I have ever seen.
We have been lucky to have been around to have witnessed two such horses in one decade. They don’t come around that often.
