It's Good To Talk

One of the measures that marks us out as a so called  “higher” species is our ability to communicate abstract thoughts and ideas. I sometimes wonder if that is an ability some members of the species homo sapiens have yet to developed to its full potential.  

I appreciate I am at an age where I am permitted to be a fully paid up member of the “Grumpy Old Men” club and as the years go by I find more and more things irritate me. One of my current bugbears surrounds communication, in all its forms.

I would like to think I am reasonably articulate and, unless confined to the 140 characters in Twitter, I can usually manage to get my point across clearly and without ambiguity.

So why is it when I take the time and trouble to make a point, those to whom it is intended do not even acknowledge the points raised and come back with irrelevant counter points?

Is it an inherent inability to understand or communicate properly themselves? Is it an acknowledgement the points made are correct but pride or stubbornness means they refuse acknowledge them? Or is it just plain arrogance and rudeness?

Who knows?

Anyway enough of the ranting, what has poor communication to do with racing?

By any yardstick last weekend’s Grand National was a massive PR disaster for the sport, even ignoring the rights and wrongs of the race itself.

What is clear is racing as an industry has been seriously wrong footed by last weekend’s events.

The official BHA response to the events at Aintree came in a press release on Monday evening, over 48 hours after the race. Now I accept coming out with knee-jerk reactions can actually make a situation worse but over 48 hours to respond?

The content of the press release was generally strong but should have been released earlier. The damage had already been done in the non-racing press and it came at a time when there were ready to move on. There was no incentive for them to publish the BHA rebuttal.

There was one interesting passage in the release, relating to the dismounting of horses at the finish. It read “all the jockeys had been instructed prior to the race to dismount from their horses as soon as the race was over in order to allow the team of handlers and vets to get water to the horses so as to prevent over-heating….” ^#

This came as news to many. I have spoken to members of the media who were at Aintree and they were not aware of the instruction. Listening to Clare Balding on BBC Television, she clearly was not aware either.

Should something so fundamental not have been passed to the media so an explanation could have been given to the public at the time?

A simple announcement would gone a long way towards explaining what was happening.

Communication in the sport has improved beyond all recognition in recent years and there is a wealth of information available. With Paul Struther’s at the helm the BHA communications team has a very competent leader. However on this occasion I feel the sport has scored an own goal.

As obnoxious as their views are, the likes of Animal Aid are extremely media savvy, they know how to get their voice heard and they can communicate well, they resonate with the layman - even if what they are saying is absolute rubbish.

What did racing have to offer? It seemed the burden of defending racing had fallen into the lap of Brough Scott. Now, don’t get me wrong, Brough is a lovely chap, he is passionate about racing but was he the best person to front the response?

To the vast majority who do not follow racing he would come across as a typical, plummy voiced, old retainer who is out of touch with reality, he would not strike a chord with the general public, no matter how respected he is within the sport.

The problem is racing is devoid of credible people who can put racings case whilst, at the same time, connecting with the public. Sadly we live in a time where the substance of what is said is far less important than how it is packaged and presented.

A perfect example, and one that really annoys me is John McCririck. He has fostered this public image of being a loud mouth buffoon, as a result few take him seriously. When the cameras are off he is a totally different person. He is very intelligent and can make some very cogent arguments to support racing. He could have been the ideal person to argue racings case in a logical, rational manner. The trouble is with the misogynistic, loud mouthed image he has engendered nobody would have taken him seriously and that is a tragic waste.    

The BHA relied on Tim Morris, Director of Equine Science and Welfare, as their only official spokesman. Now Tim held his own when making the technical arguments but his brief seemed to be restricted to responding only on the points of welfare and with the best will in the world he is not a PR person.

I do not like the idea that presentation is more important than substance but it is the reality of the world in which we live. Racing needs to be able to respond better to events like last weekends, if racing allows the likes of Animal Aid to set the agenda, it will find itself coming under increasing pressure from the wider public.

It is time for racing to be proactive when it comes to communication.

Racing For Change has done some excellent work in getting racing in the non-racing media, for all the right reasons> The events of last weekend can undo that good work at a stroke. Perhaps RfC should spend some time showing the wider media how good welfare really is.

Racing also needs to find the right “public face” of the sport and I don’t mean in the context of  a pretty face  but somebody with, I hate to say this, the personality, credibility and articulacy to project the sport fairly and accurately, somebody who can connect with the wider public.   

 ^# click here for the full BHA statement

National Reflections

The 2011 Grand National has engendered a vast number of column inches, many hours of air-time and numerous on-line debates.

A large amount of what has been said, on both sides, has been emotional and some of the views expressed have been extreme and ill-informed, fuelled by predjudices.

I have been involved in some very interesting debates on Twitter and people have expressed very heartfelt views, however one of the problems with Twitter is it allows only 140 characters and the “discussion” tends to concentrate on what has just been said, rather that all that has been said and this results in disagreement, even where there is not fundamental disagreement, and comments being taken out of context.

That is not a criticism as such, it is the nature of the beast and I am as guilty as anyone of picking up on single comments as opposed to the whole.

So for clarity and without being restricted to 140 characters here is my take on the last 48 hours.

First and foremost racing is a sport with inherent dangers, to both horses and riders. Let’s not forget as we debate the Grand National, young Peter Toole is lying in hospital in a critical condition following a fall in an earlier race at Aintree.

Being humans we are individuals, as such we each have a different moral compass. As followers of the sport of racing it is up us, as individuals, to decide what is acceptable in terms of risk and where the line is to be drawn.

To take the extreme cases, there are some who say one death is too much and there are others who do not care how many die. I don’t happen to agree with either of the extremes but at the same time I don’t think I have any right to say their own moral position is right or wrong.

How many deaths are acceptable?

In truth I do not know, I think the number is actually a movable feast, depending on many aspects. In truth the trigger for too many will probably be one single incident, the straw that breaks the camel’s back as it were.

What I do know is any death in racing is regrettable.

I haven’t looked at the numbers in detail but 2011 seems to have been a particularly bad year in terms of fatalities. Indeed the first fatality I saw in 2011, that of Joe Lively, was so bad it very nearly became that straw in my case.

Since then it seems hardly a Saturday went by without a high profile horse paying the ultimate price. Apart from the freak accident at Newbury, where two horses were electrocuted, none of the deaths hit the non-racing pages.

This brings us on to the Grand National, a race firmly established in the psyche of the nation.

In the context of the racing season it could be argued it is an irrelevant race, it is run over an extreme distance, over an idiosyncratic course (and isn’t it funny the other race in the nations consciousness, The Derby, is also run on an idiosyncratic racecourse) and it has a field of forty runners, making it all the more dramatic.

As a result the attrition rate in the National is higher and yes horses do unfortunately die. Perhaps over the years it is something we in the sport have come to accept . . . “shit happens”, “it’s part of the sport”, “it’s a high risk sport” etc etc. and yes, to an extent I agree.  If you support the sport you have to accept the risks.

Yesterday I covered what I thought was wrong with Saturday’s race. (click here)

I repeat what I said yesterday, there is absolutely no justification for broadcasting that overhead shot at Becher’s the second time round.

If I were being cynical I do wonder if the shot was shown to deliberately shock – did the director have an ulterior motive?

May I stress, at this point, I am not advocating sweeping the deaths under the carpet, they should be reported and addressed frankly and openly. My issue is the way the race was broadcast actually served to focus attention on the fatalities and distressed horses.

Those of us who follow the sport day in, day out, know the National is an atypical race. Those whose only “contact” with racing is the Grand National will know no different, they think all jump racing is like the National. That is why what happened on Saturday is so damaging to the sport.

It is very easy for those in racing to circle the wagons, to stand together and attempt to justify the sport.

It is not that simple. The world is not like that anymore. We live in a quick fix, media driven world, where image is everything. It may not right but that’s the reality.

Whether we like it or not (and I do not like it) the Grand National is the showcase event of the racing year in the eyes of the general public.

If what was shown on television on Saturday makes those who follow the sport, those who know the reality, question what is happening, what will it do to the general public’s perception of the sport?

Well we now know the answer to that one.

Racing cannot bury its collective heads in the sand, if there is a groundswell of public outrage against the sport, let’s not kid ourselves, it will not survive?

That can’t happen?  

Look at the hunting “debate” and subsequent legislation.

The debate following Saturday’s race is not simply about what is an acceptable attrition rate for the sport, it goes beyond that.

Saturday’s coverage, by accident or design, has opened up a Pandora’s box. The ramifications of the race could well make the Levy and funding debate pale into insignificance.

If nothing else Saturday’s race will make us debate within the sport what is acceptable, what more can be done to reduce the risk. We will never make the sport 100% safe but if anything can be done to reduce falls and fatalities then, logically, it must be looked at.

As much as the Grand National holds a place in the hearts and minds of racing, the facts speak for themselves. It does have a higher attrition rate, it does have proportionally more fallers, more deaths. If, for example, that means the safety factor being reduced then so be it.

I made a throwaway line in a Tweet, where I stated I would shed no tears if the Grand National was never run again and was immediately castigated for making it.

The Grand National is a great spectacle, I have been watching it since 1961. It is a race I generally enjoy watching.

In the context of the racing year the Grand National has not great significance, it is a one-off event. It does not’ like the Gold Cup or Champion Hurdle, define a champion. It is simply one handicap, out of many, which happens to be different.

It is also the single race which has the ability to bring the sport to its knees, it is a freak race, yet it is the race used to bring the sport to the public attention.

Put bluntly, in terms of the sport as a whole, I believe the Grand National has the potential to cause more damage to National Hunt racing than it does good.  That is the reason why I would shed no tears if it were, ultimately, to be sacrificed for the greater good of the sport.

Before anybody says this would be pandering to the extremists, it wouldn’t be. It would demonstrate a willingness and maturity within the sport to accept the realities. Life is not black and white and in all things compromise is required.   

Given the choice I would prefer to move the Cheltenham Gold Cup to a Saturday and have that as National Hunt racings shop window.

We need some bold, radical, decisions.   

Not Our Greatest Day

First of all may I offer thoughts and best wishes to young jockey Peter Toole, his family and friends. Peter, a promising young rider, is critically ill in hospital after suffering an horrendous fall in one of the earlier races at Aintree. Let’s hope he makes a full recovery. The latest news is he has bleeding in his brain and he is being kept under sedation at a specialist neurological unit.

Just 24 hours ago, before the big race, I asked if the Grand National is the best race for the sports shop window.

How prophetic that question turned out to be as yesterdays renewal turned out to be a PR disaster for the sport.

I will imagine Racing For Change’s Rod Street would have had a sleepless night as a great deal of their hard work was undone yesterday afternoon.

I must confess I had a very sleepless night, I couldn’t get some of the images out of my head.

I case you were on another planet and are not aware, two horses were sadly killed on the first circuit, which resulted, for the first time, in fences being by-passed in the race.

At the first by-passed fence viewers were “treated” to the sight of a dead horse lying on the ground, covered in a tarpaulin.

Even worse was the shot at the by-passed Bechers Brook, where an overhead shot showed clearly what was happening behind the screens.

Yes horses do sadly die in horse races but in “normal” racing coverage the Racetech directors and camera operators are usually very careful in avoiding shots of dead and stricken horses wherever possible.

With yesterday’s effort you actually have to seriously question the motives of the BBC director. Why were the specific shots used? Did they have an ulterior motive? Did they deliberately show the most dramatic shots in order to shock?

I think the BBC were boasting they had 40 cameras covering the race. Are they seriously saying it was not possible to have shown the by-passed fences with more “sensitive” camera angles?

Indeed I believe the shot at Bechers directly contravenes the BHA guidelines which forbids transmission of images of what is happening behind the screens.

Aintree themselves are not exactly blame free. Why was Ornais covered in a tarpaulin. Yes the horse was dead but surely somebody at the fence would have realised a tarpaulin draped across a horse does not look good. Would it not have been more sensitive to have left the screens up, at least until the field had passed on the second circuit.

However the potential damage done to the image of the sport by shots of dead horses pales into insignificance when compared with the scenes at the end of the race.

The shots of horses finishing exhausted was unedifying, it actually looked cruel.

Winning jockey Jason Maguire quickly dismounted the winner as he was clearly distressed. Now I know the adrenalin must be flowing at the end of the race but shouldn’t Maguire’s first concern have been the welfare of the horse and making sure he was OK, not celebrating the win?

Full marks to fellow jockey Davey Russell who dis appreciate what was happening and he got the horse unsaddled.

It could not have helped the distressed horses having a scrum of photographers in the unsaddling area. I cannot help but agree with a comment made by Graham Cunningham where he was suggesting a number of those photographers were simply waiting to get a photograph of a horse collapsing.

The scenes at the finish yesterday were frankly a disgrace. The already distressed horses could not have been helped by the disorganised scrum.

Instead of being a showcase for our sport yesterday’s race illustrated much that was bad about racing.

Obviously an enquiry needs to be held, which I’m sure it will be. In particular the BBC coverage of the second circuit and the disgraceful scenes at the end of the race.

I will always try to defend the sport where I can. In the face of yesterday’s coverage of the Grand National even I am struggling to defend what was shown.

Racing's Shop Window

This weekend the eyes of the general public focused on the sport we all love and follow.

Isn’t it ironic though that the race which captures the public’s imagination most is the one race that could be described as the freakiest in the calendar? (excluding those fantastic cross-country races at Cheltenham)

Run over the extreme distance of 4½ miles, over unique fences and with the largest field in the sport, it is in no way representative of the sport as a whole, yet it also happens to be the shop window of the sport.

My earliest racing memory comes courtesy of the Grand National. It was back in 1961 and I still remember Nicklaus Silver winning the race, the last grey to do so. Since then I think I have only missed one Grand National, either on TV or live at the course.

Some 8.5 million people in the UK will watch the race on television, although this is nothing like the numbers who watched the race a decade ago.

Many have debated why there has been a decline in viewing figures, for what it’s worth I believe there are two reasons.

Firstly there is more choice, both in terms of television channels and in competition for the leisure pound and time. Indeed taking into consideration the competition Aintree has, they do very well to get the audience they do both in terms of TV viewers and those attending the meeting. Saturday this year was a sell out in advance.

Then again they have an excellent product and it is very well marketed, it is a shame though the attention is focused on the one single race.

From my point of view the supporting cards on Thursday and Friday are amongst the best days jump racing of the year. Yet I wonder how many of the 55,000 racegoers at the track on Friday had ever heard of Master Minded or how many of them appreciated his performance. I would say odds-on it was a minority.

Far too many were there to participate in a fashion show and pour as much alcohol down their throats as possible, the racing was almost an irrelevance.

From the courses point of view that doesn’t really matter, as sales of alcohol are one of their biggest earners. I used to hold a licence for the Sports and Social Club and I know how much money can be made from the sale of booze and that was at subsidised prices. With the deals racecourses are able to negotiate and the commercial prices charged for the drinks, the income stream will be massive.

It has to be said Aintree is by no means the worst offender in terms of encouraging the boozers. By the last races York and Chester weekend meetings invariably resemble a High Street on a Saturday, teeming with drunks. I have often said you could run three legged donkey races round the Roodee and most of those attending would be none the wiser.

Anyway I digress.

The second reason for the decline in viewing figures is because the race has been emasculated.  Watch the reruns of old Nationals and the fences were more severe, more unforgiving. Now, although still a great test, the fences are not as severe, they are more forgiving. As a result the race has become more predictable, less of a lottery, dare I say less exciting for the casual viewer.

Let’s be honest a large number of people tune in to watch the spectacular falls, the thrills and the spills.

Of course changes had to be made, some of the fences were too severe and the number of serious injuries and fatalities was becoming unacceptable. Changes had to be made, but I wonder if the changes have gone too far. Have Aintree pandered to the so called ‘elf and safety brigade too much? Has too much attention been paid to the intolerant wittering of groups like Animal Aid?

There was an interesting feature on the BBC’s coverage of racing on Friday afternoon. They showed film from the 1970’s and 80’s where presenter’s, show-jumpers and other equestrian stars used to ride the course with cameras mounted on helmets. Richard Pitman pointed out this is no longer possible due to health and safety rules and the inability to get insurance cover.

What a sad state to be in?     

Whilst it is good to have a race like the National bringing racing to the attention of a wider audience, isn’t it a shame races like the Cheltenham God Cup, Friday’s Melling Chase or Saturday’s Aintree Hurdle are not the races concentrated on as the shop window, after all they are more representative of the day to day sport.

How many people after seeing the National will decide to go racing and then be disappointed not to see forty runner fields and seeing the horses jumping only “normal” fences?