The sales ring here at Tattersalls, where a yearling filly was sold for more than £2m on Wednesday, is a place for wildly unrealistic dreaming. Hard-nosed reality takes hold in a box about 50 yards away, where newly purchased animals have blood samples taken that will be tested for anabolic steroids.
Such tests have been a feature of yearling sales in this country for around a decade but this year, for the first time, they are being organised by racing’s regulator, the British Horseracing Authority. Previously, the testing was offered by the sales companies according to standards they themselves chose. Tattersalls proudly report they have never had a positive.
According to Hannah McLean, the BHA’s head of legal, the new system “will be more sensitive and be consistent with how we do an analysis on a normal [raceday] sample”. A failed test is likely to lead to serious regulatory consequences for those found responsible, with the horse prevented from running for 14 months.
This would all have seemed most unlikely just three years ago but then came the scandalous case of Mahmood al-Zarooni and now British racing is disposed to take a much more hardline stance in its anti-doping policy. Hence the BHA’s involvement in the testing of horses who are just one year old and months away from setting foot on a racetrack.
Here comes a colt who has fetched more than half a million just moments before, his lass still punching the air in delight. He goes straight into the BHA’s box until a form arrives from the purchaser, indicating that they would very much like to pay the £250 plus VAT, please, for the steroid test.
Blood is drawn from his neck and collected in two barcoded sample bottles, which are then sealed in packets with matching barcodes and signed by a representative of the vendor. Results of the ‘A’ sample will be shared simultaneouslywith the BHA and Tattersalls within a month.
The process, to be replicated at all yearling sales, is overseen by Tessa Muir, a vet who will formally start work on Monday as the BHA’s new anti-doping manager. The previously unannounced role requires her to co-ordinate testing of horses and jockeys, while communicating with racing professionals about what the new regime requires of them.
BHA officials concede there are limitations to blood testing for anabolic steroids. “It is a snapshot in these horses’ lives,” says Jenny Hall, a senior BHA vet, “but it wasn’t available previously. We’re pleased that we’re able to implement these incremental steps. Let’s do step one in the first year and we’ll keep working and going forwards, looking at what the requirements are in the future.”
Tests only take place if requested by the purchaser but, without releasing figures, the BHA says it is “pleased” with the uptake. One trainer here said he would request the test “every time. You’d be mad not to. If you don’t do it now and something comes up later, we’re in the shit.”
“Within the racing industry, there is a view that there is no endemic issue with doping in the sport,” said the BHA’s spokesman, Robin Mounsey. “The industry, I think, believes that and has confidence in that. This additional testing at this stage is providing clarification that not only the racing industry is clean but also the pre-training stage. It’s a validation of the view that that is also clean.
“The testing we’re doing now will give someone buying the horse confidence that, if that horse is tested, unless they administer something, they know with certainty that it’s going to be clean.”
