The new dilemma facing racehorse trainers

There is a new dilemma for racehorse trainers. ‘What do I do?’ some of them are now worrying. ‘Do I put up signs saying, “Please don’t pee in the boxes” or “Urination forbidden at all times”?’ Such measures, they appreciate, are hardly going to attract a young couple who’ve come into money and are being shown round the yard thinking of investing in a couple of horses. But if they do not take such steps they risk facing draconian punishments. Let me explain.

Newmarket trainer Ed Dunlop, from one of the most respected families in racing, was last week given a year’s disqualification from racing by a disciplinary panel of the British Horseracing Authority because Lucidity, a filly from his La Grange yard, tested positive for cocaine after finishing second in a race at Brighton. Dunlop has never before in 30 years of training been disciplined by British authorities for a positive drug-finding and the panel attached no blame to him over the cocaine.