Rob James, the amateur jockey who was seen sitting on a dead horse in a video that circulated on social media last week, will face a hearing with the Irish Horseracing Regulatory Board’s referrals committee on Wednesday after the sport’s regulator in Ireland concluded its investigation into the incident.
The video of James briefly sitting on a horse that had suffered a heart attack on a gallop shortly before its body was removed emerged three days after a similar image of the trainer Gordon Elliott.
James, who rode Native Milan to victory for Elliott at last year’s Cheltenham Festival, has apologised for what he described as his “wholly inappropriate and disrespectful” actions, adding that he was “heartbroken by the damage” the video had caused.
A hearing last Friday after an IHRB investigation into the image of Elliott sitting on Morgan, a seven-year-old chaser, shortly after the horse’s death in 2019 resulted in a six-month suspension of the trainer’s licence, with a further six-month ban suspended. The licence to train at Elliott’s Cullentra House stables in County Meath is now held by Denise Foster, who lives a few miles from Elliott’s yard.
Foster saddled her first runner from the stable at Clonmel on Tuesday. Areutheoneiwant, a drifter from 13-2 to 12-1 in the betting, could finish only third, more than a dozen lengths behind the winner, Premier Queen.
Royal Ascot boosts prize money to £6m
Ascot Racecourse said on Tuesday it will restore the prize money at its Royal meeting in June to £6m, a 66% increase on the £3.6m on offer in 2020. Last year’s meeting took place less than three weeks after racing’s resumption in June, after a two-and-a-half month shutdown due to the coronavirus pandemic, with no spectators in attendance.
The racecourse will hope to welcome at least some racegoers to this year’s meeting, which is due to run from 15-19 June – the week before Boris Johnson has suggested all significant restrictions as a result of the pandemic may be lifted.
“In 2020 we had hoped to offer record prize money of more than £8m at the Royal Meeting,” Guy Henderson, Ascot’s chief executive, said. “In the event the pandemic made that impossible and we have now spent nearly a year racing behind closed doors with trading income down 80%.
Fontwell Park
12.30 Valleres
1.00 Episode
1.30 Mount Windsor
2.00 Finnegan's Garden
2.32 Truckers Pass
3.02 Rose Of Aghaboe
3.32 The Wire Flyer
Lingfield
1.15 Ladywood
1.45 Caribeno
2.20 Western Symphony
2.50 Mercurist
3.20 Silver Dust (nb)
3.55 Diligent Harry (nap)
4.30 Aleatoric
5.00 Hotalena
Catterick Bridge
2.10 Flanagans Field
2.40 Sashenka
3.10 Smiths Cross
3.40 Ballymoy
4.15 Aheadfullofdreams
4.50 Cousin Pascal
5.25 Fruit N Nut
Kempton Park
4.10 Colorando
4.45 Silent Witness
5.15 Tellmeyourstory
5.45 Dancing King
6.15 Omany Amber
6.45 Khatm
7.15 Dusty Damsel
7.45 Viola Park
8.15 Mostallim
“This year’s prize money of £6m represents 75% of what we had originally planned for 2020. We at Ascot very much look forward to being able to welcome back our racegoers in June and delivering a special week of racing, both for those who are able to be with us on site and the many millions who will be with us in spirit through our broadcast and digital channels.”
The course announced in January that the Royal meeting will be permanently expanded to seven races each day from this year.
Wednesday’s best bets
Cheltenham is imminent but that means that the return of Flat racing on turf is looming too, and Diligent Harry (3.55), who makes his handicap debut at Lingfield on Wednesday, could be a three-year-old to follow as the new campaign gets up to speed.
Clive Cox’s colt is a son of Aidan O’Brien’s Due Diligence, who stepped up from a Listed win to run second in the Diamond Jubilee at Royal Ascot in 2014 but failed to recapture that form in four starts in 2015, having missed the remainder of his three-year-old campaign.
He has made a fine start to his stallion career, though, finishing fifth on the European earnings list for first-season sires in 2019, and Diligent Harry appears to have inherited plenty of his father’s speed. The time of his latest win at Kempton makes an opening mark of 90 look workable, and there should be plenty of improvement to come.
Silver Dust (3.20) has had more exposure with 19 runs in the book, but has been running consistently well recently and has a win in him off his current mark.
Dan Skelton has his string in rude health at present and should get another win on the board with Aheadfullofdreams (4.15) at Catterick Bridge, while at Fontwell, Episode (1.00) should be another winner for the track’s perennial top trainer, Gary Moore.
