Equinties - Rachael Blackmore

Gm Equinauts

It’s news that we all knew was coming soon, but we didn’t think it would come with immediate effect on a random Monday afternoon in May, the brilliant Rachael Blackmore has hung up her boots.

Let’s dive in.

HEADLINE ROUND UP

RACHAEL BLACKMORE

Rachael Blackmore, the greatest female jockey ever, has retired from race riding.

It goes without saying, but what a f*cking career.

She became the first female jockey to win the Grand National, Cheltenham Gold Cup, Champion Hurdle, Champion Chase, and Stayers’ Hurdle. All of these successes and more helped her create an endless string of memories, ones that have helped her inspire so many young fans of the sport.

There are very few racing people who become properly ‘household’ names. Frankie Dettori, AP McCoy, and now Rachael Blackmore. It’s a special list.

A quick scroll through Twitter yesterday showed just what she meant to so many people, and there are some brilliant tributes on there.

And it’s not as if we’ll be able to forget her in a hurry. Her legacy is just so vast.
From her endless magic on HONEYSUCKLE to her brilliant ride on A PLUS TARD in the Gold Cup, THAT performance onboard ALLAHO in the 2021 Ryanair Chase to, well, MINELLA TIMES in the Grand National one month later!

Blackmore’s CV is one that any jockey would dream of having. Actually, they wouldn’t be able to dream of her CV because it is so ridiculous. It’s honestly beyond anyone’s wildest imagination.

She was hard too. Like, proper tough. Hard as nails. The amount of times we’ve winced as she’s slammed the deck only to her then get back and walk it off is unreal. That’ll be one of the big reasons it’s almost impossible for any other female to try emulate her.

Anyway, we could go on but we’ll leave you with this. Following her win in the Grand National, Blackmore was interviewed immediately after.

“I don’t feel male or female right now. I don’t even feel human.”

This sums up the brilliance of Blackmore. She wasn’t a great female jockey; she was, quite simply, a legendary jockey. Gender aside, she is a great of a game.
Happy retirement, Rachael!

APPEALING
 
So, the connections of SHES PERFECT will appeal the decision to demote their filly in Sunday’s French 1000 Guineas.

This was something Charlie Fellowes mentioned in his immediate post-race interview on Sky Sports Racing, but he was also keen to stress that he would have to speak to the relevant people first.

Well, it seems like he has and, well, this is not the last we will be hearing about SHES PERFECT and the French 1000 Guineas.

Do they have a case?

We’ve already spoken about the interference, and ultimately, with the heat of the moment slightly settled down, you can see where the French stewards are coming from.

Even Fellowes admitted on Nick Lucky Daily that you’d have to be an “idiot” not to admit that there is interference, and then from there, it’s down to opinion as to whether there was enough interference to stop ZARIGANA from having a clear run at things.

Interestingly, Mick Fitzgerald put forward his point on Sky Sports Racing using the camera footage from the rear of the field. He makes the point that it’s actually EXACTLY, Aidan O’Brien’s filly, who pushes ZARIGANA over the most, and SHES PERFECT isn’t to blame for the main interference.

It’s hard to work this one out. On one hand, yes, Fitzgerald puts his case across well. However, these are horses who are travelling at 40mph in the heat of the moment. One nudge from SHES PERFECT probably sent EXACTLY wildly off balance, forcing her to move further left in order to regain her balance, as one would expect.
So, that’s the interference part of the appeal covered. What about the ride Mickael Barzalona gave ZARIGANA after he dropped his whip?

Quite simply, his right hand came off the reins and slapped his horse 12 times down the neck. It’s there for all to view.

For context, the whip limit in France is four, and if a jockey uses their whip over nine times, the horse is disqualified. So, when this is brought in front of the appeals committee, how will they deal with what Barzalona did?

We don’t know the rules and whether a slap down the neck is considered by definition akin to the whip? Gut feel says it won’t have any impact on the decision. They didn’t think it was an issue on the day, we can’t see them changing their minds on that one.

The counter / clutching at straws argument would be that because his hand came off the reins before making the slap down the neck surely means that they have to categorise the slap as a strike, and if that is the case, Barzalona struck his horse 14 times in total, five above the threshold for a disqualification. Fellowes made this point on the Nick Luck Daily Podcast, and Basher Watts reiterated this point to the Racing Post.

Watts said: "Mickael struck his horse twice with the whip and then 12 times in the final furlong with his hand, which we feel is unacceptable. Some may say a slap down the neck might not do anything, but in terms of the image of the sport, if that was my jockey I'd have been furious.

"If Kieran slapped our filly 12 times down the neck in the final furlong, we'd have probably won by further and kept the race. Does this open a huge can of worms? If a jockey is in trouble and getting beaten, they can drop their stick and slap their horse as many times as they want. It's not how a Classic should be won.

"Especially with everything that's going on with the sport, we need to be so conscious of how we come across. Slapping a horse so quickly in the space of seconds is not a good image."

We may have had a ‘bing bong’ on Sunday, but soon, we will be getting the ‘ding ding’ for round two in this saga, and it’s set to be juicy!

WITHOUT A SOUL

And finally, Saturday’s Lockinge will be without one of the market leaders as FRIENDLY SOUL will swerve Newbury’s big Group 1 contest.

The Lockinge looks like an interesting race this year due to the improving DANCING GEMINI and the comeback kid ROSALLION, but early entries like NOTABLE SPEECH, who beat ROSALLION in the Guineas last season, and FRIENDLY SOUL, a Group 1 winner last year, added to the picture.

Even horses like TAMFANA, who will be race-fit after Sandown, and FALLEN ANGEL, the 2024 Irish 1000 Guineas winner, made the race exciting, but losing FRIENDLY SOUL from the race is sad.

Tom Goff, who oversees owner George Strawbridge’s European bloodstock operation, said: “Friendly Soul looks great but is not running in the Lockinge at the weekend as the race has come a bit too soon. The plan is that she could run in the Group 3 Brigadier Gerard Stakes at Sandown on May 29.

"Hopefully the plan after that would be Royal Ascot, where she could go for the Group 1 Prince of Wales’s Stakes."

So, being trained by the Gosdens, she might just be a little bit behind fitness-wise at Sandown before her big Royal Ascot target. Tread carefully on her next start.

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RISK ON

There was a dubious ride on a horse we know well yesterday. We will land a big one with her.

Good bets coming this week, we’ll wait for then.

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