Leave it to the experts
Last week’s Umgeton/Unanimously protest inevitably resurrected the age-old argument about the rules of relegation.
It’s unlikely we’ll get agreement on that, but perhaps we can at least agree on another reform — eliminating the right of every man and his dog to speak at the protest hearing.
While Steven Arnold battled manfully to make a case for Unanimously keeping the race, he had nothing. He may as well have thrown up his hands and said, "You got us bang to rights, guvnor."
Mind you, at least jockeys such as Arnold may have some meaningful contribution to make to proceedings. It remains a mystery why trainers and owners, whose opinions are based solely on the same vision the stewards are working off, get to have a say.
Admittedly this testimony adds to the drama of a raceday telecast, but if we’re worried about delays, races running into each other and lost turnover, we need to keep it simple.
It is surely a rare event where connections’ testimony sways the stewards one way or the other. In almost every case, the response would be: "Well, he would say that, wouldn’t he?"
Once a protest is lodged, the stewards should sit down with the videos to come up with a decision as soon as possible, with the jockeys in the room to answer any specific questions the stipes may have.
Castlemaine (Vic)