Tempranillo runs out an easy winner of the second race at Turffontein Inside on Tuesday, a race that was marred by a false start (JC Photos)
False starts are called as per the rules in order to provide fairness to the horse who misses the start.
However, it often has the consequence of inadvertently ruining the race for numerous other entrants, which makes the whole practice a bit contradictory.
Should the calling of false starts be scrapped?
i.e. just rather let the race run and then declare a horse a non-runner, if necessary, after the race.
Today (Tuesday) in the second race over 1000m at Turffontein Inside, the starter was effectively fair to Monkeys Wedding, but in the process inadvertently ruined the race for all of Saketini, Stoneywood and Seed Seeker.
The latter trio did not do anything wrong, whereas Monkeys Wedding had been a naughty horse as he backed out of his gate as the starter was effecting the start.
The starter called a false start as soon as possible, as per the rules of racing, but this could not prevent Saketini and Stoneywood bolting the course and having to be scratched,
Stoneywood is a full brother to Dyce and his second run was being looked forward to by more than just the connections.
In the false start the fancied Seed Seeker, who is a long-striding sort who takes a bit of a hold, had absolutely pinged the gates and that immediately put him in the driving seat against a horse he had beaten narrowly before, Tempranillo.
However, the false start was then called and Callan Murray had some difficulty pulling him up.
In the second start Seed Seeker fluffed the start completely and lost valuable ground in the 1000m contest. By the time he had chased Tempranillo down he was a spent force and faded out.
The naughty Monkeys Wedding was able to reverse form with Seed Seeker by 28,85 lengths and claimed second place behind easy 5,75 length winner Tempranillo.
The well-bred Querari filly Tempranillo is a half-sister to Barbaresco and could be called a deserved winner as the horse who handled the calamity best and he did start 83/100 favourite, so might have won anyway, although he would have had to have reversed a 1,40 length defeat by Seed Seeker over 1160m in his previous start.
However, it could have been a disaster for him too because he kicked in the pens before the second start, but fortunately did not injure himself.
Nevertheless, an overall false result was created by a false start.
In fact Monkeys Wedding might be giving lessons in the stables tonight on how to make earning cheques in racing easier!
The below stipendiary report sums up the unfortunate events:
AS THE START WAS EFFECTED, MONKEY’S WEDDING (K MATSUNYANE), IN STALL GATE 6, EXITED THE STARTING STALLS THROUGH THE BACK GATE, RESULTING IN A FALSE START BEING CALLED. THE RIDERS OF ALL THE HORSES, WITH THE EXCEPTION OF SAKETINI (M K KATJEDI) AND STONEYWOOD (C ZACKEY), WERE RESTRAINED BY THEIR RIDERS, RETURNED TO THE START, EXAMINED BY THE VETERINARY SURGEON, PASSED FIT TO RACE AND RELOADED. SAKETINI (M K KATJEDI) AND STONEYWOOD (C ZACKEY) BOLTED THE COURSE AND WERE SUBSEQUENTLY SCRATCHED. THIS CAUSED A DELAY TO THE START OF THIS RACE.
THE STARTER REPORTED:
a) TEMPRANILLO (G Lerena) kicked in the pens.
b) SEED SEEKER (C Murray) was slow losing one length.
