The sprint lane at Ashburton starts at the red marker poles.
Those black and white poles you see are part of the track.
They are the rail, or what used to be.
Driver Craig Thornley on the horse you see at the top has clearly and quite deliberately cut the corner.
Watch.
Let’s call a spade a spade.
Craig Thornley cheated.
It doesn’t matter whether he did it deliberately or not, going inside the marker pegs before the sprint lane opens up, to gain an advantage, is just not on.
A lot of drivers have been doing it lately, just like a whole lot of drivers have made hocking a common practice on the big Menangle track by hitching their sulkies up tight, driving with their toe in the stirrups, and then turning their heel into the footrest when they want to kick their horse in the back leg.
Both practices are wrong, and need to be stamped out.
The only way to do that is to stomp down hard on those who break the relevant rules.
They are doing it in Victoria, but for some reason the integrity authorities in NSW are blind to the hocks, and the Kiwis continue to view blatant cheating as ‘that’s racing’.
This is why C. Thornley was fined just $200 for his sins here.
The penalty was consistent with the fine handed down to Driver, John Dunn, at Addington on 18 February, RIB Adjudicator Russell McKenzie said.
Putin’s invasion of the Ukraine is consistent with Lenin and Stalin’s annexation of the country into the USSR too.
Neither consistency makes them correct
Two wrongs don’t make a right.
But they sure do leave us left.