I OFTEN think of our profession as amateur. The reason I say that has nothing to do with how we as jockeys approach our job, just how the job can sometimes approach us.
The best annual reminder arrives ahead of the precarious start of every Aintree Grand National in recent years.
If a jockey is ruled to have coloured outside the lines, even a little bit, then they’ll get slapped with a ban. But when a race official is judged to have done the same, often the repercussions are not the same.
The reason I’m highlighting this is because of a void race that was run at Ludlow last week. The starter called for a false start but the official, half a furlong ahead on the track, never saw him signal the error.
He walked straight off the course and the jockeys, focussed on their mounts, were gone. The reason an official is positioned out the track is because when the tape goes up the jockeys will be in line with the starter and looking ahead. They won’t see him.
So a full circuit was complete and the race was labelled a void. Now I’m wondering how this will play out in the blame game because if the jockeys erred to this degree they could face a potential 21-day ban.
It got me thinking because days before I’d been chatting to Choc Thornton about his recent neck injury. He told me he was on the ground for five minutes and that the ambulance actually drove by him to pick up someone else!
When it comes to the big meets, everything is of a high standard but it’s the week-to-week, day-to-day meets where standards fall unacceptably low in my view.
There are a lot of part-time people who help with officiating and they need to hit the marks and be held to account the same way we are — every race we ride.
That aside it’s been a good week for me. I’m getting more sleep now than I ever did with the arrival of my new baby — feeding her every morning and then going back to bed with her for a snooze.
I also managed to knock in my first winner of the new season — yes we are off again — a horse called Commitment for Neil Mulholland. A fitting name for the week that’s in it!
Dougie's picks for the week:
£5 each way, Deadly Sting. 6.40 Aintree, Friday
£5 each way Tullius, Lockinge Stakes. 3.50 Newbury, Saturday
