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Horses For Courses: Whip rules deny poor Kennedy
WINNER: Swincombe Flame proved a profitable success for Horses For Courses readers.
Another big weekend winner and very soon Horse For Courses will be revered in a similar way to Pricewise. Yeah right, keep dreaming Sobot.
But as with almost everything there had to be a sour point to Swincombe Flame’s Lanzarote Hurdle success which came with the ridiculous punishment handed out to winning jockey Will Kennedy.
The fact that he was handed a seven-day ban was pretty ridiculous but being stripped of his £2,500 prize-money was just nonsensical.
In my opinion, Kennedy’s ride on Swincombe Flame was one of the best I have seen on a horse where the money was down in droves.
Our readers were hopefully on at 9-1 last Thursday – a price that was never going to last – but the odds really tumbled when that man Tom Segal of the Racing Post’s Saturday Pricewise section put him up as his best bet of the day.
Credit where credit is due, Segal is a phenomenal tipster – certainly the best I have come across and the only saving grace for the rest of us is that he is not in the Racing Post’s Naps Competition.
Gamble
If he was, he would win it every time as this guy regularly picks not just winners but big priced ones as well.
How he does it beggars belief but thankfully we too were in on the act on Saturday and from a punter’s point of view, Kennedy’s ride on nationwide gamble Swincombe Flame was sent from heaven.
It surely wasn’t that bad from an animal rights point of view either – he hit his mount two more times than he should have – and all in all his punishment just seems very harsh.
What was great, to my eye, about Kennedy’s ride was that he did absolutely the right thing by making the most of Swincombe Flame’s feather-weight.
The extremely progressive Nick Williams-trained mare got into Saturday’s contest off just 10st 4lbs – hence why she was so well fancied – and rather than mess around holding his horse up, Kennedy made weight tell by going at it from the front as one by one those behind him cried enough.
The exception was the obviously very classy Featherbed Lane who jumped to the front at the last but Kennedy knew the Phillip Hobbs-trained runner was carrying a stone more weight and gave his mount two more cracks after the last to make that 14lbs tell.
It did, the admirably game mare responding to those urgings and finding a terrific late spurt to deny the unlucky Featherbed by a desperate nose, and there is no denying that Kennedy issuing those two reminders won him the race.
Only then he is handed his punishment and while he could probably just about swallow a small ban – seven days is too long and stripping his prize-money seems unfair.
To the stewards, obviously his ride was frowned upon and hence he was punished.
To anyone else it was a masterclass yet Kennedy is the one who loses out.
There will be plenty who disagree with me and who state rules, quite simply are rules. Fair point. There was also one journo on Twitter who argued that Swincombe Flame should even lose the race because the rules had been flouted.
But the whole point is these rules are wrong and while clearly something had to be done about how many times horses were hit, the whip allowance now – seven strokes on the flat and eight over the sticks – seems too low. How can it be one more in a jumps race than a flat one given the distances?
The punishments are also definitely too severe and it is only hoped they are further amended in forthcoming meetings.
Kennedy is not a mega wealthy celebrity jockey like a Tony McCoy, a Frankie Dettori or a Ruby Walsh and that two-and-a-half grand will have meant a lot.
To strip it altogether seems very harsh – maybe syphon off some it perhaps – and it is no surprise to learn that Kennedy is going to appeal his punishment and ban which will rule him out from January 28 to February 3.
Needless to say, the Irishman was not a happy bunny on learning of his fate.
“You work your backside off and lose two-and-a-half grand,” said Kennedy after the race’s aftermath.
“You sometimes wonder why you bother. I’m not really one for hitting them but I missed the last and what do I tell the owners?
“I either hit her two more times and win by a nostril or I don’t and I get beaten.
“Who can say I would have won without those two hits? It’s disappointing.”
Indeed it is – but if it’s any consolation Will, to the rest of us you had an absolute blinder.
* For daily racing updates and tips follow Lee on Twitter @LeeSobotYEP
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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