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Letter of the Week

Speed kills

 

I feel deeply for the connections of Olliedale and Comasita, who died as a results of injuries sustained in a terrible race fall at the Sunshine Coast on Sunday December 9.

Olliedale was on debut. The filly had never trialled and her racing career lasted just on 200 metres, when she was brought down by the fallen Any Poet, which had clipped the heels of Comasita, severing both of the flexor tendons on that mare’s off hind leg.

The fallen jockeys, miraculously, escaped injury and the stewards could attribute no blame to any rider and took no action.

This was a 1000-metre race. What the stewards did not need to report was that the melee was speed-related; riders of the three horses mentioned were hunting up to improve their positions after tardy starts.

I see this happening in every speed race and my heart is in my mouth. And yet there seems to be a trend towards races that are even shorter.

Look, if I wanted to see horses race like greyhounds I’d go to the greyhounds. I fear a tragedy looming in these breakneck sprints because we all know that jockeys have no fear.

Last year, some speed freak in Your Say advocated races of just 400 metres! He called me a dinosaur; I maintain he’s an idiot!

If I was involved with either of the two horses fatally injured I would never race a horse again. I would certainly never want to see a horse of mine forced to risk life and limb in these brainless dashes in which fearless jockeys have no time to exercise due care.

Keith Lofthouse
Great Western (Vic)
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