A Classic Example Of The Whip Ban's Failure.

After Will Kennedy received a seven day whip-ban and forfeited his prize money for hitting Lanzarote Hurdle winner, Swincombe Flame, more than the statutory “eight times,” his reaction was to say...
"You work your backside off and lose two-and-a-half grand. You sometimes wonder why you bother."
I’m sure most of us sympathise with him, but how many will commiserate with the connections of runner-up, Featherbed Lane, who lost the race by a nose?
Moreover, should Swincombe Flame have been allowed to keep the race, given his rider broke the rules of racing, whereas Featherbed Lane’s young rider, James Best, seemed reluctant to use the whip at all- possibly fearful of the new rules?
Let’s face it, jockeys are going to react differently to the new ruling.
Some will ignore it and hope they don’t exceed the limit; some will count and try and keep it to the maximum; others will reduce their usage but don’t bother to count; and some may be fearful to use it at all, especially the younger riders.
Watching the Lanzarote again, James Best may come into the latter category, for he only lightly ‘brushed his mount’ twice near the post. Any vigorous use of the whip from the last fence would surely have given him the spoils.
It seems to me that you can’t separate the horse and rider’s actions when assessing what’s allowed or when rules have been broken in a horse race.
It also appears that both Will Kennedy and James Best lost out, being the victims of an unbelievably daft rule.
What do other members think, and should Swincombe Flame have been disqualified – his rider having broken the rules to gain an advantage, however stupid that ruling?
Worth a debate?

 

What's the answer Tam? It just seems to be one of those issues that will go on forever. As long as the whip is used, people will always find a problem with it. The genie is well and truly out of the box. Have a look at the link below. The horse coming widest on the bend is Super Impose. His rider greg Hall was one of the hard men of the saddle. In the last 2f he hit the horse close to 50 times.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yewKoFzCfDk

 

Put the numbers at 10 and 8, and someone will use 12 and nine. The result will be the same. Somebody will overuse the whip to get home. He'll be fined, but the beaten horse will still be beaten by a cheat. Nothing changes.

 

I was under the impression that, under the revised rules, use of the whip for corrective action is not included in the count.

 

Good morning, Cyclonic.
Yeah, I've just watched Greg Hall in The Cox Plate. The way he used the whip reminded me of Scobie Breasley ie. flick the horse's flank as he pulls the whip from behind him. Despite the number of times Hall used it, it seems to me that would cause less pain to a horse than say Lester Piggott's method of whacking the horse.
Whatever you think, I personally detest the rule.

 

Corrective would be pretty easy to see I think Ron. I have not had a look at the race yet, but you'd think that because he coped it in the neck, Kennedy was chasing the line, not correcting the horse.

 

Morning Cyc. I wasn't suggesting that Cyc. Haven't seen the race. I was commenting on Oddy's post.

 

I misunderstood mate. Sorry.

 

No problem Cyc. Should have used the Reply with Quote
.

 

7 hits permitted for a 5f sprint on quick ground versus 8 hits permitted for a 4m marathon on heavy ?
It's a nonsense - though I agree with Cyc that whatever the numbers are on occasions they'll be broken.

What the last wave of talks realised was the need for stewards to use flexibility and discretion, this still is not happening and is the source of so much frustration for jockeys.

We're approaching the best 3 weeks in the NH calendar and with so much furore surrounding the sport over the whip rules I am waiting for every half decent jockey to take a holiday leading up to Cheltenham/Aintree - why would any sane jockey risk missing the biggest meetings of the year for the sake of 10% of a winning pot of £1500 at Ludlow ?
Th emeetings leading up to the festivals could very well struggle to find enough jockeys and who could blame them ?

The BHA will not go back on themselves yet again, doing so would be a complete backdown and humiliation of their own policies, but the message needs to get across to local stewards that if a jockey goes one or two over the limit on a lazy horse then discretion must be applied, having a bunch of stewards at each course literally counting slaps can't be a good use of time and resources.

 

The problem is that the whole notion of a fixed numerical limit is inherently unsatisfactory. A jockey hitting a horse once can be a whip abuse, and a jockey hitting a horse 20 times can not be.

All that is required is that discretion is used on the part of the stewards. I would hope that people interested in racing, and who understand the sport, and the issues of horse welfare would be able to very easily determine what is an abuse of the whip and what isn't.

The problem with using discretion so widely is that it does little for credibility. To this extent I can see why the fixed numerical limit was arrived at because it is very clear, black and white, and is a simple case of you broke the rules or you didn't. That does not mean that it is right or the best policy.

It is time racing stood up for itself and placed this responsibility on people who know the sport and know horses. Then we could have a rule which was enforced by people who could actually target cases of whip abuse (ie one excessively forceful hit of frustration for example) and allow the jockeys to do their jobs. Jockeys and trainers rely on their horses for their livings. It is not in their interests to abuse them and yet the perception seems to be that they are happy to beat up a horse to get it over the line.

I am the first to cringe at cases of whip abuse but these rules just do not tackle it in the right way. A number is not the solution. It is as simple as that. Whether a totally discretion based solution is practical is another matter altogether. Hopefully the powers that be can work out a satisfactory solution, though I wouldn't hold your breath.

 

For interest, I've added another heading in the Horse Racing Forum Index, and that is Controversy. The first subject under that heading is, of course, the whip issue and an index of all identified posts so far on this subject is now available for anyone who would like to refer back to what has been said on the subject.

 

I've just watched Cyc's Youtube clip.

It was sickening to watch, especially with the horrible fall during the race.

I've never seen whip abuse like it....that poor horse.

But what was more sickening was reading all the comments.

 

.

 

My personal view is that whip rule is wrong previously it was completely discretional and you could tell when a jockey was abusing the whip so why change it?

Anyway with the rules as they are now I think 2 things strike me as completely wrong. Firstly if a jockey breaks the rules then the horse should be disqualified it's simply not fair on the others in the race.
You could hyperthetically hit the horse 40 odd times and make sure you win the race and then probably still get paid by the owners I think the fact this doesn't happen is testament to how much the jockeys care about the welfare of the horses.

Secondly it's the disproportionality between flat and jumps - Take Frankels winning time of 1m 39s in an 8f race you could hit him 7 times which on average is one every 14 seconds. Then take Long Runs GC time of 6m 29s in a 27f race you can hit him 8 times which on average is once every 48 seconds. That doesn't seem right to me!!

If you want a number (which i don't think there should be) surely you need to relate it to the conditions of the race maybe 1 strike for every 2 furlongs and then 5 after the last fence? Or dependent on how many fences there are?

It's a difficult one to discuss because whatever the outcome someone won't be happy and there will still be breaches. It'll be interesting come the Grand National what the rules are and to see how it's come full circle!

 

Interesting you should mention the National because it's widely viewed that McGuire's ride on Ballabriggs bought about the review of rules, and connections of the horse say there wasn't a mark on him and he was totally fresh the following day despite the 'outcry' at being tickled a few times on the run in.
If it comes up soft at Aintree I'm not convinced any of the 40 will finish.....

 

Very good thread with some sound comments. Overuse of the whip is reviled by most of us, I'm sure, but don't know what the correct answer is. Used to upset me greatly in Singapore to hear my Singapore friends say..."yeah, good jockey, use whip hard all the time". But really, many of the jockeys out there were Australian or New Zealanders, and their windmill style of whipping a horse often puzzled me. I was never at all sure whether they were really punishing the horse (e.g. like old Lester used to*). However, I'm sure the furious action did not escape the attention of the jockey's mount. Saw "The Enforcer" (Mick Dittman) once (he was on a one-off visit). He drew pretty bad horses in each race so I did not see much of his celebrated whipping. When I left the track (Bukit Timah in those days) I saw him, and he was looking pretty dejected and fed-up....................

*(Roberto would never have won The Derby in 1972 if it had not been for the almost brutal assistance of LP).

 

Mick Dittman was brutal Swanny. He excelled at a time when strength with the whip was considered a real asset. Strange how growing up with our own racing, leads us to believe that we have the best. (rightly or wrongly.) We in Oz have always been of the opinion that European riders were pretty weak when it came to the persuader. The windmill action was designed to give a double hit. One on the rear as the stroke came down, then another on the shoulder on the way through. (And I'm not suggesting that were are right when it comes to the use of the whip...well maybe a little.

It is good though that times are changing. As a kid I used to regularly visit the local trot track at Redcliffe. They use bloody long whips, they have to, or they couldn't reach the horse. In the old days, those whips looked from a distance like cane. They would start to hop into these horses from the bell lap, and in most cases, not let up until the line. You could be hundreds of yards away and still hear those whips being used. Nobody at the time thought anything of it though. But those were the days when we still used to execute people. Thank God times have changed.

 

For me the stewards should have the right to overturn a result depending on how many times the whip was used, the winning distance ect similar to what they do with interference. I was on Featherbed Lane that day and anyone who was on the daily thread will vouch that I was disgusted.