Delta Jocks Paying Scale Clerk
 

Oops.

http://www.bloodhorse.com/horse-raci...ded-six-months

>>>According to Equibase, Eads has ridden 1,559 winners from 11,509 mounts between 1990 and April 19 of this year. From March 21 to April 19, he had two winners from 15 mounts. Among the stakes winners he has ridden have been Maysville Slew, Indigo Girl, and Avie’s Lady.

Equibase statistics show that Santiago has ridden 231 winners from 2,865 mounts between 1990 and April 19. He was winless with 21 mounts from March 21 to April 19.<<<

:zz::zz::zz:

Whatever they did, it sure doesn't seem to have helped them.... My guess is that they were overweighted on favorites to throw the race - the fact that it is egregious enough for the LSRC to get involved after the stewards ruled and then said 6 months wasn't stiff enough....

Where did you come up with that? The Stewards probably arent allowed by rule to give them more than 6 months hence the note to get the racing commission involved.

Exactly - they are not, and escalated the case to the racing commission to throw the book at them, as they feel the violations are egregious enough to warrant much steeper penalties.

For what? Bribing the clerk of scales to allow them to carry less weight? Sure didn't seem to impact their performance based on the Equibase stats -

These are 9% jocks at a low rung slot palace that clearly did not benefit personally from whatever malfeasance they are accused of being involved in. Their performance is similarly flat going back quite a ways...

Logic would dictate that there is something much more insidious to the rest of the story, considering the stewards threw the book at them, and then went to the LSRC to say what these jocks did (allegedly) deserves a much stiffer penalty that what we (the stewards) are allowed by charter to invoke.

Ever think that its just really hard to make 112 pounds every day? I dont think this is any deeper then a couple guys who were struggling to make weight and paid their way out of it. If you dont remember this happened in New York with some pretty big guys. cough santos cough.

Which is why Real Sports looked at having jocks carry more weight....Of course most trainers were against it.

I think you are overthinking this. They bribed a racing official. That merits a pretty severe penalty in itself. In NY there was a criminal investigation with grand jury hearings and everything over the same offense (even though it wasnt true and this one is).

If there was intent to fix races dont you think that they would have been suspended for that as opposed to paying the clerk to ride heavy? Which has been going on as long as there have been jocks and weight assignments.

Because allowing them to ride at heavier weights doesnt solve the issue. Jocks will still flip, people who are even heavier naturally will reduce to get down to riding weight and where exactly do you draw the line? At some point the person has to make a decision on whether they are willing to do what it takes to ride racehorses or not. The sport and its rules arent the problem, people who simply are too big to ride who insist on riding are.

It would help though. People are bigger. No one is naturally supposed to be 110 pounds, even women.

That is not a valid argument. There is no shortage of little people.

Making weight without doing something life threatening? I disagree.

I fail to see how people cant grasp this concept. If you naturally weight 130 pounds and the weights that you are being asked to do is 115 then you either have to reduce 15 pounds or get another job. If we increase the scale of weight to 130 pounds then people who naturally weight 140 pounds are suddenly not far from riding weight and begin to reduce. If we raise the scale to 140 pounds then guys who weigh 150 pounds begin to reduce...

The thing is this, where do you draw the line? The weight scale HAS been raised and very rarely will a non bug rider be asked to do less than 115.

I understand what you are saying, I would fall in the middle of that though....If you used that rationale all the way back you would have Calista Flockhart riding at 80 pounds so it's not so cut and dry.

No one is asking anyone to do anything life threatening. If you are forced to go to those extremes to ride then you are more than likely too big. Asking jockeys to weigh 115-118, which is where most of them fall, is not unfair.

Not unfair....just that times change and bodies change. James Madison would've made an excellent jock.

Couldn't the same argument be used as far as the horses go?

Not sure how, I mean the modern thoro is surely a lot less sturdy than years ago. Drugs and bad breeding are part of the reason....I guess you could use that as an argument not to increase weight. True.

Without going off into another tangent, the increase in the number of horses bred during the late 70's/early 80's has far more to do with the reason that horses are thought of as less sturdy than drugs. I suppose that it could be considered "bad breeding".

I don't understand why jockeys would pay to weigh more. Don't they just say, "KnS +5"?

Now paying to weigh less in order to get an advantage makes sense.

Saying jockeys will be healthier if they can carry more weight doesn't seem like the issue. The issue is that someone bribed an official, right?

Especially since in LA (and other jurisdictions) you have been betting horses carrying a lot more than the listed weight without even knowing it.