“It was one of those weeks,” said Aidan O’Brien, but it felt as though a page had been turned on one of the most testing periods of his career when he saddled the first two home in the Dewhurst, won by St Mark’s Basilica under Frankie Dettori. The fact his staff were saddling two in the race was a cause for tension in itself, one day after they had contrived to put the wrong number cloths on the trainer’s runners in the Fillies’ Mile, but this time there were no dramas and even the eagle-eyed users of social media concurred that St Mark’s Basilica had indeed won and Wembley was second.
“Things happen that are not in your control and you can’t do anything about them,” O’Brien said from his Tipperary base. “Things happen and then you say: ‘Why couldn’t I have controlled that?’ or: ‘Why couldn’t I have done anything different?’ That’s just the way it is and just accept it. It was a funny week.”
Funny was probably not the adjective that came first to O’Brien’s lips last week, when he learned his intended runners on Arc day at Longchamp would have to be withdrawn, casualties of the contamination crisis affecting the Gain feed company. But among them was St Mark’s Basilica, who showed no ill effects from his wasted trip to Paris by running on gamely to prevail here by three parts of a length.
That went some way towards justifying the £1.4m paid for him at auction last year and he is now near the top of the betting for the 2,000 Guineas in May at odds of 12-1. Wembley, who made a big move from the back after racing widest of all, is available at the same odds. O’Brien will doubtless be handed a significant fine when the British Horseracing Authority completes its probe into the Fillies’ Mile, since a trainer cannot evade responsibility for ensuring his staff know one of their charges from another.
But it is possible to feel sympathy for him in the circumstances, as the mistake was made by grooms who have been based in England for this coronavirus-affected season and who have seen little of the horses concerned, while he has remained in Ireland throughout.
Goodwood
1.15 Kashi 1.50 Twilight Heir 2.25 Ask The Wind (nb) 2.55 Elegant Light 3.25 Eye Of The Water 3.55 Night Of Dreams 4.25 Natural History 5.00 Latent Heat
Newton Abbot
1.45 Flic Ou Voyou 2.15 Glajou 2.45 Master Tommytucker (nap) 3.15 Sunset Showdown 3.45 Oscar Asche 4.15 Paricolor 4.50 Stormy Ireland 5.20 Pozo Emery
“There but for the grace of God go I,” said more than one trainer here and the BHA will hopefully consider what changes are necessary to prevent a recurrence. It was surprising to learn that although horses’ identities are checked twice before racing, both checks occur before their number cloths are fitted. Delaying the second check until after that point now seems essential.
The BHA say protocols introduced after the Charlie McBride case in 2017 were aimed at alerting trainers who had sent the wrong horse to the races and also at ensuring horses do not take part in the wrong race. They had not anticipated the particular mistake that caused problems on Friday.
But would it have been so hard to foresee? “We closed the loophole,” said the BHA chief executive, Nick Rust, early last year, emailing an owner to reassure him the sport was well run and such mix-ups were a thing of the past.
The email, passed on to this correspondent soon afterwards, also spoke of “a double lock” protocol being introduced to establish each runner’s identity. It seems hopelessly overconfident language, 21 months later.
