Yesterday, the NSW Stewards reprimanded jockey Kathy O’Hara for her tweets about another licensed jockey. Were they right in doing this?
This is a tricky one and one has to wonder where and when some tweets are “approved for public consumption” and other tweets are out of bounds.
Will the O’Hara reprimand stop jockeys and trainers and even others tweeting? Or will they tweet such bland messages that their followers will eventually drop off?
More to the point, are Stewards in a position to approve what’s appropriate and what’s not?
We live today in an age of technology and social media and social networking. It cannot be stopped and there’s no going backward. Also, as the music industry learnt the hard way as have musos, online copyright laws, libel and defamation laws are still very grey areas. Cyberspace is an online wild west where anything goes. Just look at some of the comments on YouTube- if you can stomach most of them- and which have nothing to do with music or love or life but racism and sexism.
Look at all the spamming and hacking and the proliferation of porn sites and where even personal pictures and home-made films of two consenting adults engaging in sex can be uploaded by an angry ex undergoing some warped sense of revenge.
Hell, I am out there somewhere, thanks to the fury of a woman who felt scorned. What can I do? Grin and bare it and move on and know that seeing me doing the love fandango will be more of a permanent turn off and the ruination of many people’s sex lives than some short term turn on.
Now, looking at all of this, think about the warning to Kathy ‘O Hara. Also think of the other ways twitter and SMS messages can be or are actually already being used behind the barriers, being used by “part-time”operators working and “placed” with some corporates and how easily all of one’s betting transactions can be hacked and sent half-way around the world. It’s been done- and that’s the scary thing.
The Wikileaks of horse racing has begun and began almost two years ago.
Like the music industry and their stupidity in ignoring Napster, few in the racing industry even know any of this or have thought about the repercussions and the need for stringent laws put in place to stop this usage of technology for illegal means and the need for common sense when it comes to something like tweets that are quite simply someone’s personal opinions about a race and the performance of a jockey- and Miss O’Hara’s ex- who incurred the wrath of every other jockey in that race this week at Hawkesbury.
Priorities, it’s all about priorities and, as usual, racing’s internal policing are playing three blind mice and not seeing the far greater problems.
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THE GURU ON THE OCTOBER 1 MEETING AT SHATIN
When Dougie Whyte doesn’t compete at a Wednesday meeting, it doesn’t really matter. After all, it’s another Happy Wednesday evening at Happy Valley and it’s more like a carnival night while us gypsies, tramps and thieves move from The Beer Garden and ‘live’ music to the paddock area, make our picks, make our bets and go up to either Adrenaline, The Gallery or The Stable Bend- all venues- to watch the races and then hit The Beer Garden again, the city’s playground for the cool and the and the best damn meeting place in Hong Kong.
It’s Facebook- but happening for real and making human contact and not some cold online social network
In other words, the racing takes equal parts importance and becomes part of the total Happy Wednesday experience.
Sunday at Shatin, or this time, racing at Shatin on Monday and on China’s national day is when seeing the name Douglas Whyte not amongst the jockeys competing – he’s suspended and still in Phuket- kinda makes the meeting somewhat incomplete. It’s like a Happy Wednesday meeting without ‘live’ music- good ‘live’ music.
It’s not the same.
Sure, there are races to run and won and some very good jockeys led by Zac Purton, but Whyte is a drawcard. Some people love to see someone up there fail and so it is with the twelve time champion jockey and where those who get some weird kinda horn in their pants watching a champion not win getting their cheap thrills. They are petty peasants- and there are hordes of them in every industry in Hong Kong.
Whyte is also good for turnover and pushing out odds as his followers engage in “chasing” whenever his horse from one race fails to win. “Chasing” can get expensive if the top jockey continues to go winless, but hey, that’s racing and why “chasing” and knowing when to pack it in comes with experience, but more to do with knowing when to Just Say No as opposed to Just Do It. Sometimes, even Nike gets it wrong.
With no Whyte on Monday and it’s interesting to see who’s riding the horses he would have and wondering if they’ve been primed for wins or if their runs on Monday will be more like trackwork while they wait for their regular rider to be on their backs. On Monday, Tye Angland, one-time rodeo rider, BMX freak, and Christian Bale-lookalike, takes over most of Whyte’s rides for John Size and which are kinda worthwhile following as the horses are no doubt still fit and Angland has been riding in superb form- strong, determined and proving that he is right up there with Zac Purton, Brett Prebble and Dougie Whyte when it comes to riding talent. And, boyohboy, does The Tye boy love to ride, or what.
Why “kinda”? Apart from Adoration, I think they’re either on their mark or have some serious mental issues in that they are bloody inconsistent. And who has time to keep following them until they are in the mood to win? Also, Size seems to be undergoing some serious spring cleaning of his stables to make way for new horses and who knows if these runners might be having one last throw at the stumps before going the way of former Size gallopers like Glory Of India which is now with Paul O’Sullivan and where, last week, as favourite, it ran like a loser. Same with King Mossman which has now left Size for Peter Ng and ran as I thought last Wednesday- badly.
On Monday, The Tye Boy takes over from The Whyte Man on last-start winner I Smell Money, Adoration, and the devilish Holyangelholy which needs some urgent exorcism following two flops in a row when a short-priced favorite. Size slaps blinkers on the latter galloper, but unless I see it running with a crucifix around its head and a halo over it’s head, leave me outta it.
Angland also rides some poor thing named Garlic Boy in race 2 and which makes me wonder what on earth possessed the owner to give him this stinker of a name? Perhaps it’s named after a particularly strong Korean Gangnam style meal and which made people flee from him?
Zezao, another horse Whyte rode last week for Richard Gibson and which flopped like saggy titties over 1000 meters tackles 1400 meters on Monday and has Olivier Doleuze up. How will it do? It’s a competitive race and, at best, I can see it perhaps placing- in a saggy kinda way.
If, apart from The Zac Attack, there is a jockey to follow on Monday, it’s Weichong Marwing, but as one very experienced racing man has said many times, “How will we ever know which Marwing turns up?” When he’s good, Weichong Marwing is very good, but when he’s bad, he’s three and four wide and heading to McDonald’s for a McHappy Meal.
Weichong Marwing as a child?
Still, I am going to be a masochist and despite seeing some shocking rides from him this season, I’ll still back “Wayward” Weichong on David Hall’s Dapper Boy and Breeze Of Luck- an odd partnership- as long as the news that they’re both “goers” don’t reach Oz and the odds come crashing down in Hong Kong.
“One Big Mac to go.”
As is now the norm, The Zac Attack who would have flown back after partnering Little Bridge in Japan, well, he has another good book of rides- Meridian Treasure, Dominant, Wrath Of Fire, Strathtay and Scarlett Camellia. The best of these? Wrath Of Fire over 1800 metres is a personal favourite but the weight might anchor it down. Strathtay, hmmm, pass, whereas Scarlett Camellia, it can never be left out and is fast-becoming one horse I will always follow.
“Very good! Nice firm ones.”
“You think I don’t know???”
As for Dominant in the Group 3 National Day Cup, it appears to be the second string in trainer John Moore’s four runners in this race and where Admiration to be ridden by Brett Prebble looking the stable elect. In fact, Prebble, also back on Monday from Japan, looks to have the strongest book of rides of all the jockeys and should be at short odds to take out the jockeys Challenge.
“Mmmmmm.”
Worth following at the meeting for value is the Tony Cruz stable. Putha Man has a number of runners entered and with double and even triple entries in a few races. And when the savvy trainer does this and goes with the numbers, careful. There’s always a fly in the ointment and a fly in his gelled pompadour.
“Putha, man, there’s no fly in my hair! That’s Brylcreem!”
Some of the jockeys Cruz is using aboard his runners has a huge WARNING sign going off in my head. There’s a healthy Six Up Bonus to be won and the stable can upset a few hot pots as can some of the local boys like Eddie Lai, Alex Lai- both riding very well so far this season- and even 10-pound claimer Dick “Louie” Lui on Plentiful in Race 9. You have been warned.
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