Quote:
Originally Posted by ScottJ
Agree on the difficulty of being dispassionate regarding Toast of New York, but let's look at clauses (c) and (d) of the California rules :
(c) A horse which interferes with another and thereby causes any other horse to lose stride, ground or position, when such other horse is not at fault and when such interference occurs in a part of the race where the horse interfered with loses the opportunity to place where it might, in the opinion of the Stewards, be reasonably expected to finish, may be disqualified and placed behind the horse so interfered with. (d) Jockeys shall not ride carelessly, or willfully, so as to permit their mount to interfere with or impede any other horse.
Bayern's break clearly impeded at least three paths and more likely four paths from the break which would be interpretted as a violation of (c). More important however was that Garcia was clearly shoving for the lead and made little attempt to straighten the forward path of Bayern which was in violation of (d).
If Bayern had to correct course and straighten coming from the gates, you can be assured that he would not have been on the lead which would have compromised his chances in the race; in fact, everything there would have taken a completely different complexion.
As a result of an evaluation of (c) and (d) in addition to the consideration of Bayern potentially being course corrected, a disqualification was the proper call.
|
I think they (erroneously) determined that while a violation of clause (c) occurred, it was deemed to not have occurred in a key portion of the race. How you can determine that the break was not a key portion of the race, and thus had no final effect on the outcome of the race, is beyond me. I've read that the stewards look less harshly on the first jump or two (besides a horse being held too long) and even if that was the case, the second violation was well beyond that point.
I view the decision yesterday as rewarding dangerous riding. Thankfully, Shared Belief didn't get hurt and was able to finish the race. I found the race to be disappointing and hope they all meet again soon.