Nicky Henderson Found Guilty

Hamm said:
:rolleyes:
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I think John makes a good point if your going to cheat why this horse this race if you go to a court your prev's. good caracter is taken into accout as is your income for sentancing, were any other horses checked if there were strange betting pattens or financhel gain was made that, another matter.
 
interesting reading this thread and those similar ones re Fallon

likeability - it really does make a difference....same offence..cheating............fallon had people ringing their hands before any hearings..Fallon cleared of cheating but is still pilloried..but now people are loath to criticise Henderson..who is guilty...purely down to likeability

an interesting study in the human condition is this :)

a similar outcome re Piggot/Ken Dodd..Dodd the affable clown...cleared....Piggott the perceived tight arse...anti establishment type..jailed..knighthood removed

Glitter the hated sinister tiddler toucher..Jackson the innocent adult child

outcomes of hearings/court cases and general public opinion are swung on perceived personality..there is no such thing as same treatment for all.
 
Henderson has always seemed a fairly sharp man to me; I find it very hard to believe he didn't know that TA was a banned substance, and even harder to believe that he was unaware that only feed and water can be given to a horse on the day of a race.
 
Andy said:
I think John makes a good point if your going to cheat why this horse this race if you go to a court your prev's. good caracter is taken into accout as is your income for sentancing, were any other horses checked if there were strange betting pattens or financhel gain was made that, another matter.
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It's not just this race though Andy - this is just the horse it showed up in. The BHA have said themselves in the statement that there's no telling how many other times Henderson has given this drug to horses before a race.
 
Right - what to address first!

How can anyone say that he's just had a slap on the wrist and can carry on as normal? If that were the case, the BHA wouldn't have stipulated that horses from Seven Barrows cannot run, they'd have said horses trained by N Henderson cannot run which would have meant he could have got someone (probably his assistant) to babysit the licence for three months; this is not allowed. A £40k fine is hardly a slap on the wrist either!

However, it does appear that the BHA have been fairly lenient on Henderson as they could easily have banned him for a year or more.

As for James Main, I'd doubt somehow that he'd be struck off, being one of the most well respected and experienced vets in the Lambourn Valley and a partner in the large practice of O'Gorman, Slater and Main. James is widely thought of as a very good vet and renowned throughout the industry.
 
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One thing that has to be said is that although I doubt it lessened his (for want of a better word) sentance. I admire the man for the manner in which he has appeared to handle the whole thing so far, hat off to him for that. I wish him well after his suspension and during.:)
 
SL
Intereting post, but it begs the question what is Mr Main well respected for? An ability to administer an illegal substance on the day a horse is racing?

richard
 
Gareth, if I want to call a very lengthy transcript waffle, in spite of Britain becoming more and more proscribed in what is permitted in speech and writing - I can. Waffle simply means something that goes on a long time, in this context. And as you've drawn attention to the offending lapses in the medication book, they are directly the sort of thing that the BHA is very keen to not have happen, as I said. The entries, regardless of whether they're made by stable staff or the seven dwarves, must be signed off by the trainer. It's the trainer's responsibility to know what gunk's being put onto or into his charges (after all, he's going to present the owners with the vet's bills afterwards), and it's not good enough that he didn't check the medications register daily or, at worst, every few days to ensure he'd signed off on final treatments. He's responsible, the staff is not. End of.
 
NH should see further than the fine and ban and do everything to aswage the title of 'cheating trainer.'

One idea is that he should voluntarily pay the BHB to test every one of his runners from the time he returns to the course for a period of at least two years.

This may prove expensive for him but needs must, otherwise he should simply walk away from training business.

To me unless he does something like this he will forever have that aforementioned title.

MR2
 
Well, I apologise if forum experts on a keyboard think James Main is a crap vet, or bent, or crooked. In the 10+ years of dealing with him I have found him to be a very good vet, as have several high profile yards in the Lambourn area.

Since all you self defined experts find so many things crooked about the sport, why don't you stick to online poker?
 
krizon said:
Gareth, if I want to call a very lengthy transcript waffle, in spite of Britain becoming more and more proscribed in what is permitted in speech and writing - I can. Waffle simply means something that goes on a long time, in this context.
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Did I stop you from calling it waffle? Did I edit or delete anything you wrote? No, so stop over-reacting like you've just had your right to free speech curtailed somehow.

Give me strength.
 
EC1 said:
like I said..Fallon was one of the best jocks..is it relevant to events though?

are these events not judged on evidence rather than reputation?
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I would say if it's relevent as to what took place between charging and trial. Henderson did not appear to protest, and feel he saved his character and career reputation in the process. Others I feel did somewhat protest too much about how hard done by they were, given certain factors in the Betfair case I would imagine at least one or two realise now the consequences of their actions. What they did learn though is what remains to be seen.
 
Shadow Leader said:
Well, I apologise if forum experts on a keyboard think James Main is a crap vet, or bent, or crooked. In the 10+ years of dealing with him I have found him to be a very good vet, as have several high profile yards in the Lambourn area.

Since all you self defined experts find so many things crooked about the sport, why don't you stick to online poker?
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thats a little bit of over reaction

I asked if it was relevant..no idea who the bloke is or how good he is..I will presume he is well respected ...at his job...as you say
 
I should think one or two things came out of the woodwork. It is what is not said that I am concerned about, something doesn't seem right about the whole thing and I would hazzard a guess there will be more to come on that basis alone.
 
Because in poker a spade is a spade, where as in racing - a spade is something you pick up shit with?
 
Point 19 in its entirety:

19. Mr Main himself said in his first interview on 19 March that he was unaware that TA was prohibited and that he only learnt that it was when he looked in the Rule Book after 17 March. Though the Panel was conscious of the need for caution in expressing views about the truthfulness of the evidence of a professional man, especially when he did not give evidence in person, the Panel found it impossible to accept that a vet with the experience Mr Main possesses did not know that TA was prohibited. He is the Senior Veterinary Surgeon at Newbury racecourse. He sits as the NTF representative on the Veterinary Committee and on the Counter Analysis Advisory Committee of the BHA. He is also the NTF’s Veterinary Advisor. Furthermore, his description of the purpose of his visit to MOONLIT PATH on 19 February as a “pre race check” was, in the Panel’s view, calculated to mislead in the event of an outside investigation. It would also mislead an owner who might come to see the invoice. He had been booked for a visit to administer Dycenene. He gave a TA injection and (it seems) did nothing else to the mare, yet describes this as a “pre race check”. According to him, he was unaware that the mare was due to race on 19 February, so the misleading label was not an attempted concealment of a breach of Instruction C9, it was a concealment of the administration of a prohibited substance.
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It is obvious from the many positions that he holds that Mr Main is a highly respected vet. But it is equally obvious that he does not come well out of this. The first sentence alone in the quote above must make him cringe.

European racing has been proud to portray itself as drug free, in contrast to needle happy Americans who use bute and lasix and god knows what else as a matter of routine. Nobody over here would ever touch any of that stuff, don't you know, nor anything else you could care to mention. It is all banned, nobody would try it and nobody would ever get away with it. We breed from the best, our best will always be clean, and we at least are doing our bit to ensure that the thoroughbred of the future is sound.

At any rate that was the theory, but now we learn that one of the most respected trainers there is, and his equally respected vet, don't really believe in the rules at all. The kindest interpretation is that they thought they were entitled to override the rules whenever their superior knowledge and judgement told them that they could.

Henderson and Main probably have some points in their favour. Rules, after all, are usually a blunt instrument and are seldom entirely rational in all their situational outcomes. But if the BHA takes no further action against Main it would in effect be admitting that its rules are not worth upholding, even though both men deliberately contravened them, and one of the clearest guiding principles of European racing would be sacrificed.
 
Greg Wood in The Guardian:

MOONLIT CASE PUTS TRAINERS ON RED ALERT

Henderson was using prohibited drugs on his horses on a regular basis

Despite a claim by John McCririck yesterday that Nicky Henderson had been "condemned in a secret court in a tribunal, of which we have not seen the evidence", the full written reasons why a panel chaired by an senior QC found him in breach of the anti-doping rules are available on the internet for anyone to inspect, and certainly make for very interesting reading.

The facts are these. Henderson asked his vet to inject one of his horses – a horse owned by the Queen, though that is a side issue – with tranexamic acid (TA) on the day of a race.

When Moonlit Path tested positive, he claimed he did not know TA was a prohibited substance (even though nothing should be given to a horse bar normal food and water on the day of a race). Then he said it was administered for the horse's welfare, which is really neither here nor there, since a horse that needs a little something extra to help it race should not be racing at all.

The panel invited Henderson and James Main, his vet, who also pleaded ignorance, to pull the other one. It also decided that Moonlit Path was far from an isolated case. Henderson had been using TA for "some years", and it "was typically given to horses which Henderson thought might benefit from it on the morning of their race".

The true extent to which TA formed part of the training regime at Seven Barrows may never be known. It certainly will not be used any more – another positive and Henderson can kiss his career goodbye. Nor are we likely to discover the extent – if any – to which this is linked to Main's considerable determination to avoid giving evidence to the hearing.

It takes only a single reading of the panel's reasons, though, to realise that Henderson's penalty would – and perhaps should – have been more punitive still, had he not been such an ambassador for the sport in the past.

And every trainer – and vet – in the country should read them as well, though you wonder how many will. Henderson was using prohibited drugs on his horses on racedays on a regular basis. He was caught. He tried to wriggle out of it. He failed. His career is now on hold, the Queen is probably considering her position as an owner at the yard, and his wallet is 40 grand lighter too.

The message is this. Be careful, ladies and gentlemen of the British training fraternity. If it can happen to Nicky Henderson, it can happen to you.
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From Wood's news piece on the subject:

Yesterday's detailed ruling, published on the BHA's website, also raises serious questions about the conduct of James Main, Henderson's vet, who administered the prohibited substance.

The panel noted that Main, who is also senior vet at Newbury racecourse, had declined to give evidence to the hearing into the case. The panel said that, along with Tom Symonds, one of Henderson's assistants who also did not appear, Main "had potentially crucial evidence to give".

The "animal history" at Main's practice, the panel said, describes his visit to Henderson's yard as simply a "pre-race check". This, they said, was "calculated to mislead in the event of an outside investigation". Furthermore, the panel said, they "found it impossible to accept that a vet with the experience Mr Main possesses did not know that TA was prohibited".

A spokeswoman for Main's practice said yesterday that he "is not in a position to comment at this stage", while Stephen Higgins, the managing director of Newbury, said that "we have never had any problems with his veterinary support to Newbury".

Main is also a member of the BHA's counter analysis advisory committee, which determines where a "B" sample will be tested following a positive drug test result.

"We will be reviewing Mr Main's position on that committee," Paul Struthers, the BHA's spokesman, said yesterday. Struthers declined to confirm or deny whether the authority will pass its opinion on Main's conduct to the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons.
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(emphasis mine)
 
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