‡ Yet Another Dubious Stewards Decision There is a long-standing complaint relating to stewards decisions that is shared by virtually all horseplayers: they should be more consistent in their decision making. Such complaints are legitimate, and consistency should always be a goal, not only in the officiating of horse... racing. But it seems to me that the problem illustrated by the DQ in Del Mar's 11th race on Saturday is, in some ways, even more frustrating. I am referring to what seems to be a far too common inability of stewards to watch replays carefully, and thoughtfully process what has been seen. While I credit Del Mar for having edited together all three views of the incident in the embedded clip, it would have been better if they had (also) slowed down the drone view, which, as is so often the case, appears to be the definitive view. I have extracted the salient drone view portion and zoomed in on the action, so that readers might more easily see the crucial incident that the stewards apparently failed to take into account. The dubious decision to DQ the winner (#3 red and white silks) was made on the basis that nearing the wire, it drifted out, and caused the eventual fourth-place finisher (#5 pink silks) to steady, possibly costing that one a better placing. But I would argue that a careful, and reasonably thoughtful viewing of the drone shot, clearly shows something different. Just before the incident referred to by the stewards, the #5 horse (pink silks) and #9 (yellow silks) made contact, and it was that contact which initially caused the former to steady. The winner did subsequently drift out, but that was incidental, and did not, at least on its own, cost the #5 a placing. In fact, that the two even came so close was arguably a direct result of the #5 briefly losing its hind-end as a result of the bumping with the #9 horse. Had it not been for that initial contact, causing the #5 to angle in towards the eventual winner, there almost certainly would not have been any meaningful loss of momentum. Parsing it even more finely, it appears, again from the drone shot, that the #9 was not at fault, and it was, ironically, the "victim" in the questionable eyes of the stewards (#5), which angled in and lost its hind-end as a result of that earlier contact. Given that the rider of #5 had understandably steadied more sharply after the initial, far more dangerous incident, the most important momentum loss had already occurred before the rider again steadied slightly, due to the winner drifting out. In summary, there were clearly two incidents which contributed to a loss of momentum on the part of the #5 horse. Equally clearly, it was the initial incident, not even mentioned by the stewards, that caused the greater loss of momentum. In my view, the incident that the stewards used to rationalize the DQ was trivial, relatively speaking, and given the broader context, there should not have been any change in the order of finish.show more

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