Ryan Moore, who suffered an injury to his neck when unseated in the stalls before a race at Newmarket last Thursday, was resting at home on Wednesday evening after leaving Addenbrooke’s hospital in Cambridge following scans which “didn’t show up anything of any concern”, according to Jayne Moore, the jockey’s mother. There is still no indication, however, as to when he will be fit enough to return to the saddle.
“Ryan is fine, he’s OK and he’s at home,” Jayne Moore said on Wednesday. “I think he had some further x-rays today and it didn’t show up anything of any concern, so he’s just resting up at home for a while. I’ve got no idea when he’ll be back. He probably feels like he’s been in a car crash, but he’s fine. Knowing him, he won’t be back until he’s 100%.”
Gary Moore, the jockey’s father, said last week that he expected his son to be out of action for “at least a month”. If correct, that would force Moore to miss both the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes at Ascot on 25 July and the five-day Glorious Goodwood meeting the following week. Moore is also the narrow leader in the Flat jockeys’ championship with 51 victories this season, two more than Silvestre de Sousa, the odds-on favourite for the title. Moore has drifted from odds-on to 10-1 for the title since suffering his injury last week.
Golden Horn, the Derby winner, has been confirmed as a “definite” runner in the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes provided the ground is not testing.
“We’ve definitely decided to run next week as long as the ground is not very soft or heavy,” Anthony Oppenheimer, Golden Horn’s owner, said on Wednesday. “Hopefully the weather will stay as it has been, nice and fine.” Golden Horn took his unbeaten career record to five races when he took the Coral-Eclipse Stakes at Sandown Park earlier this month. Victory for John Gosden’s colt at Ascot would make him only the fourth horse to win the Derby, Eclipse and King George in the same season after Nashwan (1989), Mill Reef (1971) and Tulyar, who completed the treble in the second running of the King George in 1952.
“The list of horses to have done what he is attempting is elite and it would be very nice to create history,” Oppenheimer said. “Having sponsored the race for many years through [his family’s diamond company] De Beers it would be extra special if he won it. He showed he was versatile at Sandown, making all the running. It was a tough way for him to do it but he came through again.”
Britain’s racecourses are on target for a new modern-day attendance record after nearly three million people went to the races in the first six months of the year. Total attendance from 1 January to 30 June was 2,987,103, an average of 4,184 per fixture, an 8% increase on the same period in 2014. The six-month total in 2011, when the final figure for the year was a record 6,151,243, was 2,979,062.
Good weather is believed to have contributed to the strong figures, while the announcement in February that Tony McCoy, the most successful jump jockey in history, would retire at the end of the 2014-15 National Hunt season in April also helped to swell crowd numbers at tracks where he was competing.
“While factors beyond our control, mainly the weather, play a significant role in achieving these numbers,” Stephen Atkin, the chief executive of the Race Course Association, said on Wednesday, “the racecourse and central sales and marketing teams, supported by the national promotion of the sport by Great British Racing, must be congratulated on their hard work to capitalise on the opportunities that are offered to sell our sport.”
Tropics, who was beaten a nose by Muhaarar in the Group One July Cup last Saturday, could end his season at the Breeders’ Cup meeting in the United States.
“He’s been second in three Group Ones now, getting nearer each time,” Dean Ivory, the gelding’s trainer, said on Wednesday. “It wasn’t the ground he would ideally have liked. For him to run like that, it gives everyone in the yard a big lift.
“The Stewards’ Cup [at Glorious Goodwood on 1 August] is only a slim possibility now, I’ll probably avoid that altogether and sit a little bit longer than normal.
“We’re in the Haydock Sprint Cup [in September], the Champions Sprint at Ascot [in October] and we’ve been invited to Kentucky for the Breeders’ Cup and I might do that. If we go to America he probably wouldn’t go to Ascot.”
