D day for new whip rules

Monday afternoon race meetings at Salisbury, Windsor and Yarmouth can rarely have been under the spotlight in the way that they will be today. The new era in British racing which begins today is one governed by strict rules on the use of the whip and controversial tough penalties for those who misuse it.
Jockeys face the loss of riding fees and prize-money coupled with longer suspensions if they exceed the maximum of seven strokes on the flat or eight over jumps. Since the new rules were announced two weeks ago the initial broad welcome for them has disintegrated, with substantial opposition growing amongst jockeys. It’s not that the jockeys are opposed to change, but rather the fact that the new rules are being introduced without any trial period and that there is such a severe combination of penalties that has so angered them.
Professional Jockeys Association chief executive Kevin Darley said, “I’m submitting a paper to the British Horeseracing Authority (BHA) to request that we sit down and have a meeting and go through a proper consultation process in regard to these financial penalties because the jockeys are dead against them. As far as I’m concerned, financial penalties were mentioned (during the consultation process), but it was basically an open debate, what should we do? Some jockeys were quite strong on upping the penalty, or fining them, but not both and not as severely as they (BHA) have done. We seem to have been railroaded really.”
However, Frankie Dettori says jockeys must adapt their riding styles and make the new rules work. “I think a lot of us accept that something needed to be done and it’s up to all the jockeys now to work to the new rules. The BHA tell us that there is a problem with the public perception of the sport and I think reducing the number of times a jockey can use the whip is the right move. I wouldn’t want to see the whip done away with altogether. I’ve ridden in Scandinavia where they can’t use the whip at all and trainers have to work hard behind the scenes to gee a horse up for the racecourse. That doesn’t seem right to me. It won’t be easy to get it right. It sounds silly, but in the heat of a race it isn’t easy to keep counting right in your head. But we have to get it right.”
Paul Struthers, the BHA communications manager, was unrepentant about the decision to apply the new rules immediately, pointing to jockey behaviour the last time there was a significant change concerning whips. He said, “What we have found in the past is we introduced a three-month bedding-in period when we introduced the shock absorbing whip, and with very few exceptions riders simply kept using their old whips as long as they could. We felt that having announced these changes, it wouldn’t have been right not to implement them for a long time.”
Struthers explained that substantial efforts had been made to ensure that everyone involved understood the rules thoroughly. He said that both the BHA and the Professional Jockeys Association had contacted all professional riders with full details; all jump jockeys had attended a mandatory seminar about the changes within the last fortnight; and stewards have all had their customary training day as they do whenever rule changes are introduced. Today, he went on, “The only thing we’re doing is making sure that jockeys are briefed again by the stewards before racing. It’s a pretty straightforward rule; the stewards know how to implement it. If anything passes by the stewards, we have the ability to pick up on it centrally, but that makes the presumption that stewards are going to miss things, whereas I suspect they will be extra vigilant.”
There are arguments on both sides whenever change is introduced. In this case what is at the centre of the debate is the impact on a jockey’s livelihood: that any transgression will hit them much more severely in the pocket than has been the case to date. But surely what’s more important is whether the changes are good for racing. For the next few months of course, there will be occasions where the rules are tested. When I’m watching racing I can’t always tell whether a jockey is actually hitting the horse or using sight of the whip to encourage his horse. Are stewards any better placed to draw this distinction?
It does also mean that current jockeys will need to change their riding style. But if we look further into the future, the next generation of jockeys will learn their craft under the new rules. There is clearly a key role for trainers and organisations such as the British Racing School to build this into the development of young jockeys. If the result is a greater emphasis on horsemanship rather than “whipmanship” can that be anything other than good for the sport?
Like it or not, neither can racing afford to ignore the wider public perception of the sport. The image of a seemingly out-of-control jockey appearing to whip a horse in a frenzy of activity always damages racing. These new rules should prevent that happening, and so remove one of the sticks that animal welfare organisations and the once a year viewer have used to beat the sport