Just wondered if anyone noticed the fall of Dubai Crest yesterday in which sadly the horse then had to be put down. The horse had recently been sold on the 13th November out of Nicky Henderson's yard to that of John Cornwall. As far as I have heard from those at Seven Barrows the horse was never schooled over fences and yet ran in a chase at Leicester just 6 days after being sold. In the race he made an absolute hash of the first and looked to have no experience chasing. He then fell at the next and paid the ultimate penalty. The horse clearly had talent but in my book this is a very poor training performance and the horse really should have never ran. Would like to hear the opinion of others.

Yeh I heard about it on Twitter. Its pretty disgraceful tbh and I think the trainer should be 'investigated' by the authorities to find out what happened.

He is also had his son on the horse I think which I find just as bad. Not only has he killed the horse but he could have seriously injured his son.

John Cornwall never heard of him
what did he actually do wrong i didnt see the race

I actually completely disagree about the first fence, I think the horse jumped it well (maybe over jumped a little) but it was the jockey who made it look bad by being completely off balance on landing and most probably the cause of that slight stumble on landing. Then at the second you can see that the jockey knows he's wrong but he does nothing to help the horse apart from a few fairly feeble squeezes in front of the fence when it is all too late (also the completely wrong thing to do on a novice). In my opinion he should have given the horse a pull and let it get in close and brush through the fence, he may have still fallen but the horse wouldn't have landed on his head like that, more likely his shoulder, he would have rolled over and galloped on. I think this is a case of complete jockey error and he should be kicking himself for the loss of a lovely horse.

With respect to the horse having never schooled over fences, so long as you have a willing learner you can easily teach a horse how to jump bigger obstacles in 6 days. Well enough to run in a low grade race with a decent jockey on board. However I think the placing of this horse was poor, a class 3 race with a couple of decent types in it, plus a jockey who looks like he is more novicey than the horse. I appreciate that there are lots of horses being bought by parents for children to ride but maybe people should be rethinking it... Anyone see Utopian last week?? Shocking!

You are right Supercat the horse did in fact jump the first well and it was the Jockey that looked untidy over it. I am not the biggest fan of jumps racing and prefer the flat, but I do occassionaly take an interest as I love the sport as a whole. However, the horses welfare has always got to be put first and in this case I don't believe it was. Changes surely need to be made to stop occurrences like this happening. Perhaps the blame should lye with the Jockey, as with Utopian, neither jockey seemed to do the right thing with either horse (Utopian's at no point looked to have full control of the horse when jumping or riding a "finish")

I understand that alot of conditionals, apprentices, amatuers ect need experience but perhaps they should be restricted to races they can ride in until they meet certain criteria.

My mate used to own him (well his dad) and prior to his sale on 6th November he had never jumped a fence. The fact he run a week later suggests to me he'd of probably had one schooling session at most, and that really isn't sufficient enough to send a horse chasing.

It has not only ended in fatality for the horse concerned (who was a lovely horse) but could have had vast consequences for the jockey also.

But the horse doesn't need to actually jump a fence before going chasing, do you think show jumpers and eventers meet every kind of fence they encounter on the schooling ground... No, they are taught how to jump properly by professionals before they compete; which I'm sure he was a Henderson's. To add a racing example Paul Nicholls (the last time I checked) doesn't even school his horses over 'fences' he teaches them how to jump properly which is why the majority are so good, then it doesn't matter what you send the horse into if it knows how to do it, it will do it. Irrespective of how many times he schooled he jumped the first well thereby proving that he could indeed jump, he needed help at the second (most novices do need help at some point, and experienced horses often do too) but the jockey sat there and did nothing. It is complete jockey error, and in my eyes his fault the horse had such a crashing fall. Nothing to do with lack of schooling, the horse showed he could jump a fence at the first. The jockey could have been riding Katuo Star, or Denman and if he'd done the same at the second the horse still would have fallen and been killed.

He wasn't. As I said earlier he had only ever schooled over hurdles at home and had never jumped a fence be it at a racecourse or on the schooling ground at Seven Barrows.

But he was a hurdler, therefore he could jump! Yes, the styles for jumping both obstacles are different, but I believe that Henderson has the French style hurdles for schooling rather than the English style ones, so he had jumped a fence. Also from what I know of Henderson (not a massive amount, but enough) most of his horses are bought with a view to go chasing so he would have to ensure he had set an excellent grounding for all his hurdlers to make sure they school on to become chasers. I'm sure Binocular who is almost definitely always going to be a hurdler has been schooled and taught to be a hurdler because it is to his benefit. But you wouldn't school every horse like that because they aren't going to be able to jump a fence adequately. Still complete jockey error and incredibly poor placing by the trainer, in a weaker race with a better jockey the horse would have stood up and could have won. The horses' experience jumping is not the problem, it was the lack of any help from the saddle and the fact that he was in a fairly hot race for a Monday afternoon at Leicester against horses he couldn't get near over hurdles.

As another example show jumpers rarely jump, they do most of their work on the flat and over trotting poles and small cross fences. They don't drill everyday over 1 m 60 cm fences, they don't need to. The groundwork has already been put in place, the horse already knows HOW to jump. This should be the same with top (all really) trainers and their racehorses, there is no need to school and drill the horses every week because you should have already taught them the basics meaning that you don't have to. What you need to teach is how to get in close, alter your stride, take a stride out etc. and some take longer to learn than others. You would not expect a novice first time out to know all of that, it comes from experience. Hence why you need a jockey on a novice horse who can make those decisions for him when he meets the fence wrong and doesn't yet know what to do.

So how can things be improved?? Do we stop amateurs/apprentices from riding in novice races?? Do these horses need a more experienced rider to ensure this doesn't happen again.

Yes and no. In this case the horse needed more help and with a more experienced/forceful jockey he would have been given the help. However, I don't think the horse should have been running in a race like that after such a short space of time with his new trainer. It was very poor placing by the trainer in this instance exacerbated by the bad ride by his son. I don't know what you can do, they obviously thought the horse jumped well and I am inclined to think that he did so there is no way you can investigate the trainer. He would say 'the horse jumped well and had been schooled well at Henderson's', you can't investigate the jockey because I bet he'd say that it was totally his fault and he has learnt from it and would do it differently next time. It is a learning curve, people and horses have to learn. Sadly Dubai Crest paid the ultimate price for that learning curve, it isn't right but I really don't know what you can do to prevent it.