THE SENSE OF DREAD IS ALL TOO COMMON

YOU don’t really expect the subject of horse racing to come up when listening to the Today Programme on BBC Radio 4. I almost spat out my morning coffee when I heard that top trainer John Gosden was hitting the airwaves on Friday’s show.

There is a sense of dread when the mainstream media focuses on racing and the general expectation is that it will be negative coverage and inevitably the default instinct is to defend the validity of the sport.

Gosden was asked whether the sport has a problem with drugs. ‘I think there’s a problem in this country and many others, and I think the use of recreational drugs is endemic,’ was the trainer’s response.

At a BHA hearing, Gosden was fined £500 by a disciplinary panel that ruled his filly Franconia tested positive for ketamine that was probably derived from her groom’s use of the drug.

As the conversation carried on, that familiar sense of dread kicked in. ‘Racing is a multi-billion pound industry that is very well regulated and a big subscriber to the Treasury,’ said Gosden. ‘The horse racing here is the highest standard in the world, something to be proud of. It’s a good part of UK plc and I don’t understand why the BBC tend to be negative about it all the time, I’m afraid.’

Cue flashbacks to the coverage of the Cheltenham Festival in 2019 when lockdown loomed large, the Panorama programme on racing’s ‘dark secrets’ and the Gordon Elliott scandal. Throw in the fact that the BBC have cut back on their coverage of racing then he has a case.

The most amazing thing when the integrity of the sport seems to be under attack, is that the BHA seem to be missing in action.

It’s down to leading trainers or jockeys to answer questions on issues that, frankly, should be dealt with by the authority in charge of the sport.