Benny Andersson gives backing to Lady Jockeys’ World Championship
• Abba star has given money and support to Swedish racing
• Horse at centre of Cheltenham doping case possible Perth runner
Chris Cook at Bro Park and Greg Wood
Tue 4 Jul 2017 19.00 BST Last modified on Mon 27 Nov 2017 04.23 GMT
Benny Andersson pictured at the Lady Jockeys Thoroughbred World Championships in Sweden on Tuesday.
Swedish racing is “an emerging market” according to one of the officials charged with running it and on Tuesday night it made a bid for the attention of the wider racing world by staging an international jockeys competition under the strikingly bold title of the Lady Jockeys Thoroughbred World Championship. Hayley Turner and Sammy Jo Bell were among nine riders from various countries to compete here in front of a small but appreciative crowd including Benny Andersson of Abba fame, a longstanding racing fan.
“It’s a small sport in this country. Very small,” Andersson noted and even his money and support over decades have not been able to change that. But there is certainly ambition and also an urgency born of necessity. In 2019, Sweden will have to give up its monopoly over betting on racing, from which the sport has derived a steady income.
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“We have to make a new and better product for the future,” said Dennis Madsen, head of racing at the ruling body, Svensk Galopp, which brought members of the foreign racing media here to see action at this track, opened just last year. The card was also broadcast live in Britain on Racing UK; Madsen would very much like to stimulate overseas interest in his sport, from both punters and owners of horses just below the highest class who might come here in search of a winning opportunity.
Madsen is struck by the fact that Swedish punters stake millions of euros each weekend on trotting racing, a sport almost unknown in Britain. There are dozens of trotting tracks here, against just three for the Flat racing familiar to British punters. Even a fraction of the turnover that trotting attracts would turn around racing’s finances. “If you reach for the sun, maybe you come to the stars and that would be good enough for us,” Madsen said.
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This event cannot hope to live up to its title, at least not in year one and without the participation of any rider from North America. As is the nature of all international jockey competitions, the distribution of mounts can never be entirely fair. But everyone seemed to be having fun and France’s promising young Maryline Eon won a couple of races and the overall title to make up for her two saddles that were lost by a baggage handler between here and Paris. Danielle Johnson, who is about to finish second in the jockeys championship in New Zealand, won one race and went close in another.
Other jockeys also gave up more than just their time to be here; Sammy Jo Bell’s whip, alas, did not make it out of Manchester airport, where security staff told her: “You could do some serious damage with this.” Bell retorted: “It’s cushioned! I’d do more damage with my iPad if I hit someone with that!”
Hayley Turner made it, just hours after her winner at Windsor on Monday night, and insisted that this, her second comeback in as many years, will last no longer than the first. She enjoys taking part but is a broadcaster first and foremost these days.
Andersson was briefly disappointed to hear this, as he has a two-year-old filly, Sing A Rainbow, in training in England and wants a jockey. He would prefer a woman (“Because … why not?”) and suggests he will hire Josephine Gordon when his filly makes her debut.
Now 70, Andersson has lent his backing to this event but denies suggestions that it was his idea, pointing the finger instead at Derek Thompson, a ubiquitous presence for decades in British racing media who also, somewhat surprisingly, turns out to be influential in Scandinavia. He performed MC duties and introduced the jockeys to the crowd here in unapologetic English.
“I’m a feminist,” Andersson said. “This [event] has nothing to do with that. This is not active feminism because feminism is about equality and it’s not very equal to have a race where you exclude the guys. But Thommo said it and I said: ‘Yeah. OK. Fine. Go ahead, I’ll support it.’”
Andersson enjoys coming to Bro Park (“I think it’s going to be really nice”) but expresses a strong preference for English racing. “That’s the country for racing. I know there’s Ireland and Italy and France and the US but it seems like it’s coming from England. It feels like that to me. The traditions and the beautiful tracks you have, the breeding industry ... all of it.”
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There is a part of West Sussex that will be forever ABBA, as it turns out. Goodwood is Andersson’s favourite track. Amanda Perrett’s nearby stable is “a wonderful place, amazing ... Even if I hadn’t known her, I’d have said, this is the place to keep a horse.”
The prize money for the very best English races has also been an attraction for the 70-year-old, now a 25-year veteran of the racing game. “I thought, if I have a good horse in training in England, maybe it could pay for 20 years of breeding in Sweden. I’m still on that track...”
Anseanachai Cliste, a nine-year-old chaser at the centre of a possible doping inquiry triggered by events at the Cheltenham Festival on Gold Cup day, remains a possible runner at Perth on Thursday after being withdrawn from two engagements at the same track on Wednesday.
Stephen McConville, who trains Anseanachai Cliste in Portadown, County Armagh, and his son Michael, who has ridden the horse regularly in point-to-point events, have been under investigation by the British Horseracing Authority since the horse was taken out of the Foxhunters’ Chase, the race after the Gold Cup, at Cheltenham on 17 March.
At the time, an official report said only that the stewards had ordered the horse be withdrawn as “they could not be satisfied the horse had been administered only normal feed and water on race day”. More recently, it has been reported that a blood-covered syringe was found in Anseanachai Cliste’s box, and that a subsequent dope test on the horse revealed that it had banned substances in its system.
Anseanachai Cliste won the Ulster National and a first prize of £13,500 just nine days after his withdrawal at Cheltenham, and before the result of the dope test ordered on 17 March had been confirmed. He has also run twice since that victory, at Kelso on 28 May and then at Downpatrick on 18 June, finishing unplaced on both occasions. The gelding was a 33-1 chance for the Foxhunters’ in March prior to his sudden withdrawal, but arrived at the Festival meeting on the back of eight straight victories in point-to-point events between February 2016 and March 2017, for six of which he was ridden by Michael McConville, who is also the nine-year-old’s owner.
Anseanachai Cliste, red colours, holds off Tulsa Jack to win the Ulster National at Downpatrick.
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Anseanachai Cliste, red colours, holds off Tulsa Jack to win the Ulster National at Downpatrick. Photograph: racingfotos.com/REX/Shutterstock
It is BHA policy not to comment on ongoing investigations, but if Anseanachai Cliste is declared to run on Thursday, the regulator could come under pressure to use its powers under Rule 83 of the Rules of Racing to refuse to accept the declaration. The Authority used a sub-section of the same rule to prevent Gina Mangan, an inexperienced apprentice jockey, being declared to ride Diore Lia, a rank outsider, in the Derby at Epsom in early June, although the filly was subsequently scratched on the day of the race.
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The Cheltenham Festival is jump racing’s showpiece event and the unusual circumstances surrounding Anseanachai Cliste’s withdrawal from this year’s Foxhunters’ will guarantee significant interest in any resulting disciplinary case. If Anseanachai Cliste is found to have been injected with a performance-enhancing substance in his box on 17 March, there could also be questions for the regulators both in Ireland and Britain as to how and why the gelding was allowed to continue racing once the results of the test were known.
Contrary to a report in Tuesday’s Racing Post, which suggested a charge against McConville is “imminent”, it could be several weeks before the outcome of the BHA investigation becomes public.
When contacted by the Guardian on Tuesday, McConville said that he was not able to confirm whether Anseanachai Cliste will be declared to run at Perth on Thursday.
The nine-year-old had two possible engagements at Perth on Wednesday, in the featured £15,000 handicap chase and also in a three-mile handicap hurdle half an hour later, but was withdrawn from both at the overnight stage on Tuesday morning. He is also entered in the £8,000 Mackie’s Cream of the Crop Handicap Chase at Perth on Thursday afternoon.
Wednesday tips
Thirsk 2.00 Fink Hill 2.30 Rockies Spirit 3.00 Give Em A Clump 3.30 Wentworth Falls 4.00 Kirkham 4.30 Andok 5.00 El Cap 5.30 Prazeres
Perth 2.10 Penny Jane 2.40 Martiloo 3.10 Bell Weir 3.40 Russian Regent 4.10 Barkis 4.40 Beat That 5.10 An Fear Ciuin
Worcester 2.20 Murray Mount 2.50 Prettylittlething 3.20 Oksana 3.50 Slim Pickens 4.20 Gibson Park 4.50 Phangio 5.20 Poetic Lady
Bath 6.00 Pursuing The Dream 6.30 Royal Mezyan 7.00 Black Trilby 7.30 I’vegotthepower (nb) 8.00 Attain 8.30 Fanfair 9.00 Plato’s Kode
Kempton 6.10 Varsovian 6.40 Billesdon Brook 7.10 Sileel 7.40 Pumblechook (nap) 8.10 Clowance One 8.40 Nuzha 9.10 Hersigh
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https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2017/jul/04/horse-anseanachai-cliste-centre-cheltenham-festival-horse-racing-doping-inquiry-perth-runner
