WHAT better way to sign off for Crimbo than with a classic Good, Bad and Ugly.
Yes, I’ve been keeping my beady eye on a handful of jockeys lately, including Harry Skelton for whom the good times continue to roll.
I’ve been pretty critical of Harry in the past. It might not be popular to say but I’ll come out and say it – I was of the opinion he was getting opportunities because of who he was (brother to Dan and son of legendary Olympic equestrian Nick) not what he was.
I’ll never forget the 2021 Cheltenham Festival which was a disaster from start to finish for poor old Harry. Every decision he made ended up being the wrong one.
It happens. God knows I’ve plenty of cock-ups to my credit but, for it to happen on the biggest stage was unfortunate, to say the least.
However, Harry has gradually been winning me round and I think he has well and truly proven me wrong, especially over the last 12 months. Of course, he gets to ride plenty of good horses for his bro, who is going to take plenty of stopping in the title race this year, but he is riding like a man possessed.
Not just on the big days, either. He gave Cherie D’Am an AP McCoy-esque ride from the front to win at Warwick the other day. It’s going to be a hell of a battle for the jockeys’ crown between him and Sean Bowen.
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Now, the ‘Bad’ came after Charlie Deutsch’s superb winning ride on Gemirande at Cheltenham last week when, funnily enough, he got the better of yer man Harry.
Venetia Williams joked she thought Deutsch would have to amputate one of his limbs to make the weight of 10-2.
And the gaunt-looking rider revealed in the 72 hours before the race he had eaten just an apple, a banana and a small piece of salmon. Come to think of it, he was probably dehydrated as well as starving.
Yet he went out and rode a peach to win one of the biggest handicaps of the winter while probably feeling as weak as a kitten.
Jockeys have had to do crazy things to keep the weight off for hundreds of years, though the days of infamous ‘pee pills’ or forcing themselves to be sick are (hopefully) a thing of the past.
But I can’t imagine the sports leaders found it comfortable listening – if they indeed were – to one of our finest jumps jockeys describe how he had to starve himself to make racing weight.
With saunas on racecourses canned, many jockeys are going to extreme lengths off the track to keep their weight in check.
Surely, if saunas are finished for good, common sense says we should nudge minimum handicap weights up by a few pounds, to make life more bearable for all the jockeys.
It’s 2024, for goodness sake.
Nobody should have to deprive themselves of food and drink in order to do their job.
It’s a bad look. On that subject, the ‘Ugly’ occurred at Newbury on Wednesday when Lorcan Williams went whip-happy on Captain Bellamy.
As I’m sure you are aware by now, seven is the stroke limit in a jumps race and if you go four or more over you get disqualified. Williams used his whip 11 times and, rightly, the horse was chucked out yesterday.
I’m no fan of the whip rules, but it was an inexcusable piece of riding and it was no surprise trainer Paul Nicholls was royally pissed off.
Williams used the whip once before the last and a whopping TEN TIMES after it.
They weren’t exactly love taps either. I don’t want to kick the 23-yearold rider while he is down as, not only does his future as part of team Ditcheat look under threat, he has also got a 14-day ‘holiday’.
We are relying on our jockeys to be sensible with the whip – and at least being able to count. It is not a welfare issue, but incidents like this give the ‘antis’ an open goal.
Still, far be it for me to be a grinch, I wish poor old Lorcan, and each and every one of you, a very Merry Christmas.
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