Ruby Walsh: Issues arise, questions remain after the Tramore stable yard affair

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Viking Hoard was ‘got at’ in Tramore on October 18, 2018. Actually, ‘nobbled’ was the word Lynn Hillyer, head of anti-doping and chief veterinary officer of the IHRB, used last Monday at a remote hearing of the IHRB’s referrals committee into the running and associated irregular gambling surrounding the horse’s run at Tramore on that date.

To simplify ‘got at’ or ‘nobbled’, it means someone knowingly sedated the horse before it ran in order to make sure it could not win. Why? Because cheating has always been the easiest way to win and when you have the platform to take bets, losers are as good as winners.

If or when this happened in the 1980’s, people could only back winners, unless a bookmaker was involved but that meant slicing the apple pie thinner, so the horses that were ‘got at’ were two of the top three in the betting in selected races.

By ‘nobbling’ two and leaving one, the chances of the chosen one winning multiplied hugely but it still had to go and win in order for crooks to collect. The crooks won but they lost a few times too.

However the 2018 effort in Tramore was fool-proofed by the fact that since the 1980’s, betting exchanges have appeared and anybody can now back horses to lose or ‘lay them‘, to use the correct term.

The chosen platform here was Betfair which has an agreement with the BHA and IHRB to divulge any information surrounding suspicious gambling patterns — and that would seem like a wonderful plan if it didn’t contain such flaws in practice.

So on the afternoon of October 18, 2018, somebody with access to the Tramore stable yard, sneaked into Viking Hoard’s stable, whilst his trainer Charles Byrnes and son, Cathal, were either gone for something to eat or to find a rug for the horse, and administered enough sedative to the horse to make him test 100 times over the international screening limit of 10nanograms /millilitre of urine when tested post-race.

This third party was not a chemist because they gave the horse enough ACP (the chosen sedative) to all bar knock him out — but clearly someone associated with the third party was then able to use an account on Betfair to bet €34,889 to win €3,200 on Viking Hoard losing in that afternoon’s race — knowing they had completely removed Viking Hoard’s chance of winning.

Obviously, the account collected but it had also enjoyed plenty of previous success with Viking Hoard putting up €30,000 to win €12,000 at Sedgefield in October 2018 and €55,000 to win €12,000 at Galway the previous July.

All ‘winning’ bets but on the basis of the horse losing, though it is fair to point out he was not sedated at Sedgefield (as his test was negative) and wasn’t tested at Galway.

Irregularly, he drifted alarmingly in the betting on all three occasions so when the IHRB go looking, Betfair will be able to tell them who is the registered account holder, and they will have a starting point for the enquiry.

Who, with access to the Tramore stable yard has a connection with this account holder?

Lo and behold it seems the account holder is a company limited by guarantee in some far-flung corner of the world with an attachment to an individual linked to match-fixing and associated betting in other sports.

The account was a white-collar customer of Betfair’s, basically a shell company which places bets on clients’ behalf. Betfair has since closed this line of business for lay bets.

So a fat lot of good the Betfair agreement was here and while the IHRB referrals committee accepted that Charles Byrnes had no link to the betting and accepted a third party ‘nobbled’ his horse, they still did not accept he was completely innocent and by leaving Viking Hoard unattended in his stable at Tramore, he facilitated a window for a third party to do the dirty deed. Charles has exercised his right to appeal too.

He was handed a six-month suspension of his licence and a €1,000 fine for his brief absence at Tramore on the day. Harsh you might think for the crime of getting a rug, or bite to eat, but it permitted a criminal to endanger equine and human life — whoever doped Viking Hoard tarred Irish racing and could have killed Kevin Brouder and Viking Hoard for the sake of €3,200.

Nobody was caught in 1980’s here and nobody was caught in 2021 either but for an organisation receiving over €9m per annum to spend on integrity, perhaps the IHRB could invest in a few cameras for the stable yards?

Tramore has since put some in for their own security but on race days, the athletes in course stable yards are under the auspices of the IHRB and it is at their door that industry safety and integrity lie.