The organisers of the Cheltenham Festival announced this week that the number of horses in some of the races at this year’s event will be reduced owing to safety concerns.
I completely understand the safety aspect of the decision, but what difference will removing two horses make? If four or five horses were cut, that’s fair but I don’t think two is worthwhile.
I think I wouldn’t want to hurdle if that was the case. We have a balloting system in horse racing for the big races and sometimes I’m on a horse that is just inside the ballot.
If these procedures were in place then, I might not have got the rides. Another scenario is maybe a horse that now won’t make the cut could have won the race. I’d like to see how they came to the conclusion that 24 runners were unsafe but 22 is fine.
It isn’t a nice place to be, in the corner before a race with 24 horses trotting around and the circle getting tighter and tighter, but that is what makes the sport.
What would jump racing be without horses jostling for position, false starts and bad jumping? Imagine a Grand National without those aspects.
Last week there was a lot in the press about racing with a low sun. We as jockeys get a lot of flak about omitting fences in these conditions – some trainers even call us soft.
Believe me, when you ride and you or your horse cannot see what’s in front of you with maybe one in six horses clever enough to assess a jump in those conditions, it’s tough.
I would like more to be done regarding visibility in the low sun, especially during the winter months, rather than the size of a field.
I went hunting Christmas Eve with a couple of friends from North Yorkshire.
It was good fun; I hadn’t been hunting for years. A couple of the lads took a fall while we were out and broke some bones. I started to think it might not have been a good idea and I might not
be riding Boxing Day.
Christmas Day was a recovery day and my in-laws joined us for dinner. It was my daughter Aoife’s first Christmas. She is a bit young to understand what was going on but it was still good fun. It was back to work Boxing Day and I managed to nab a winner that day and the following, which was a good way to start back.
The Monday before Christmas I went to the Lesters, which is a big awards ceremony in horse racing. It’s a great event where all the owners, trainers and jockeys from the jumps and flat meet up.
Lucy Alexander is a jockey from Scotland who’s done well for herself over the years but has had some problems with injury recently. She’s come back and picked up three Lesters which was brilliant as a northern jump jockey has not done that before.
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