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Brian O'Connor

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No Pain No Gain

Camlann was one of five recent winners disqualifiedCamlann was one of five recent winners disqualified
© Photo Healy Racing

Announcing the disqualification of five 'winners' for positive drug tests hardly made for good 'PR' last week. They were the latest in a series of uncomfortable headlines about a spike in positive drug tests during 2018. That makes for embarrassment. However Irish racing needs to ensure short-term discomfort doesn't interfere with long-term plans for getting its anti-doping house in order. Embarrassment goes away. It's a symptom. Fretting about symptoms and not causes is a cop-out.

Other sports have found to their cost how circling the wagons to try and avoid short-term discomfiture is counter-productive when it comes to doping. But whether by accident or design racing here finds itself at a crossroads. One route can take it on a path towards the implementation of proper long-term anti-doping structures. The other only pretends to.

In the past racing's default reaction has often been one of containment rather than acknowledgement. Cycling calls it spitting in the soup, when anyone veers off the copy-approved official brochure and draws attention elsewhere. The outcome has made cycling a byword for sporting corruption. Only the naive or those with an agenda can believe any of it anymore.

Such dismissal inevitably invites accusations of lazy caricature. But that's the consequence of years of 'PR' fire-fighting rather than proper root-and-branch reform: people have an uncomfortable habit of believing what they want to when it to comes to credibility. And once a caricature takes hold of the public imagination it's difficult to loosen its grip.

In many ways racing is perversely fortunate with its own cartoon representation since expectations aren't high in the first place. You don't have to scratch the surface too hard at this Sport of Kings shtick to find deep-rooted popular cartoon prejudices about dodgy, bandy-legged, syringe-toting chancers filling animals with anything at all in order to make them go faster or slower as required.

That's why when the steroids controversies emerged five years ago there was an overwhelming sense of 'told you so.'

All those previous smug assumptions and official assurances about holy Ireland somehow being exempt from the doping temptations of other jurisdictions were revealed to be hollow. And the inevitable conclusion many came to was that such assumptions were part of a general reluctance within the horse game to lift too many rocks and peer underneath.

Since then enough rocks have been lifted to show how woefully inadequate Irish racing's anti-doping system has been. That needs to be faced up to, with new standards set and statements of intent lived up to rather than any reflex return towards the sort of containment attitude that still lurks within so much of racing and breeding.

It's an attitude that has already made tortuous progress towards the introduction of a new overall anti-doping policy feel like that of the schoolboy trudging unwillingly to class.

Even now, with a framework finally in place to allow testing take place by IHRB officials on unlicensed premises, there remains that self-defeating clause about prior-day notice which inevitably dilutes credibility and impacts far beyond that particular sphere. It lifts right out as a retro move in what's intended to be a brave new dawn.

From a purely racing point of view though if talk of a new dawn in 2019 really is to stand up then the spike in positive tests over the last few months has to be viewed generally as evidence of a system finally doing what it's supposed to do.

It's highly unlikely it is due to anything dramatically different in general trainer practises. What does seem to be different are processes, both in terms of detection and prosecution. If the consequence of that is a short term spike in embarrassment then that can be a price well worth paying in the long-term.

Inevitably last week's revelations will have some nodding their heads. 'Shark' Hanlon may be perceived as a lucky man to get a suspended 18 month sentence after Camlann's positive test at the Galway festival for elevated cobalt levels. Cobalt has created headlines around the racing world with its performance boosting potential linked to EPO. Yet up to recently there wasn't even a capacity to test for it here.

But then there was the testosterone that Dermot Weld's filly Kisingia tested positive for at the Curragh while Steve Mahon's disqualified pair, Trump Sixteen and Rocky Court, tested positive for arsenic. Gordon Elliott's Kilbeggan winner Timiyan returned a positive test for an anti-inflammatory.

There are headline-grabbing names and substances in there. But it doesn't require too deep a dig into the detail to see where the IHRB's head of anti-doping, Dr Lynn Hillyer, is coming from when arguing that she is actually more reassured than alarmed by what was uncovered.

For instance the Weld filly's positive test was due to a 'tumour' and the trainer was cleared of any blame. Mahon escaped penalty in relation to the arsenic positives because the substance was sourced in seaweed the trainer was feeding his horses. Elliott was fined €1,000 but the rule breach was basically down to a mix up over withdrawal time for a legitimate medicine.

"What we're finding in extremely thorough investigations of these cases is a lack of understanding and, if anything, slightly nudging sharp practise. But not doping. And there's a big difference between the two," Hillyer has said.

"When I began the job two years ago I said I didn't believe there was an issue but that we didn't know. We do know what we have for the total of testing so far, and right here, right now, I'm reassured by these cases rather than concerned," she added.

So it is to be sincerely hoped that racing doesn't shy from these sort of embarrassing headlines but rather acknowledges them in the context of a sector that might finally, and hardly before time, be starting to get its house in order.

If that means ploughing through more uncomfortable attention - and there are at least seven more cases reportedly to come - then it's vital to properly deal with it without losing sight of the bigger picture. This really looks a case of there being no long term gain without some short-term pain.

Inevitably within the industry the question being asked is what has changed this year to prompt this spike in positive tests.

Equally inevitably there has been speculation about the end of the IHRB's long link to the BHP laboratory in Limerick and the consequent switch of testing to overseas labs, particularly one in England. An internal review is underway in the IHRB into the circumstances surrounding the end of the IHRB's 22 year link with BHP last February.

There is also apparently a more vigorous approach to investigations and a speeding up of the disciplinary process with test results being considered in the right timescale.

Of course the various sectional agendas within Irish racing will always focus on their own specific self-interests. But the overall focus here - the sort of focus both Horse Racing Ireland and the IHRB are charged with - has to be on the implementation of a modern, up to date, fit for purpose and properly financed drugs regime.

If that means an on the ground shake-up of veterinary and training practises when it comes to drugs, whatever the consequence in terms of publicity, then that's a good thing in the overall. Just as tightening up the housekeeping around passports and vaccinations is a good thing in the overall. As hopefully will be the installation of a new official testing lab for Irish racing next month.

Whether this supposed brave new anti-doping dawn in 2019 ultimately becomes a reality rather than just another exercise in optics is hard to predict. Just as it is hard to come to black and white verdicts on whether anti-doping strategies are actually working or not. By their nature that is difficult to definitively establish.

But people do come to their own judgements on the credibility of their intent. Last week's headlines might have made for temporary embarrassment. But the hope must be they are just one sign of official determination to properly regulate a sector far too important to be worrying about short term appearances rather than concentrating on long-term results.