Philip Barnard

Philip Barnard, born on October 27, 1967, was one of Britain's top conditional riders.

On Boxing Day, 1991, riding Sayyure in a handicap hurdle at Wincanton, he crashed heavily to the ground at the second-last. He was rushed to Yeovil District Hospital and later transferred to Frenchay Hospital in Bristol where he died.

Philip was undoubtedly talented. Indeed, Martin Pipe, the champion trainer, had pencilled in the young rider as a potential replacement for Peter Scudamore when the then champion jockey decided to retire.

Philip, who was single, lived in Baydon, near Lambourn. He had been conditional jockey to Sayyure's trainer, Tim Thomson Jones, for two years.

Jones said: 'He was a talented jockey and a nice person who worked hard and got on with everybody. It's tragic that this has happened at a time when he had so much going for him.'

Philip joined Mick Ryan, the Newmarket trainer, after leaving school and stayed there for three years before a similar spell with Lester & Susan Piggott..

His first winner was Bellagio, trained by Ryan, in the Charter Handicap at Yarmouth in June 1985.

Philip nominated his win on the Piggott-trained Morestyle Girl the highlight of his career.

Increasing weight forced him over the hurdles. He had his best season in 1990-01 with 16 winners.

Philip’s father, Jim Barnard, is still very angry with the racing industry, and their woeful disregard for safety and human life.

This is his story:

My son died due to the extreme pressures of riding horses to win. I have but one interest in horseracing and that is recognising and improving the lot of the young and the lowly who are encouraged to ‘work’ in this business. General lip service is given to these concerns by some of horse racing’s establishment and I have correspondence from some to that effect, but I think that nothing really changes.

My son entered this business as a result of a keen interest from childhood in horses. I remember the idea of becoming a jockey being encouraged, possibly, by a well-meaning but nevertheless interfering romanticist neighbour. 

However from then on I take the responsibility for the course that Philip took. I signed the forms permitting him to be apprenticed to a flat racing trainer in Newmarket. Prior to this Philip had spent his last summer holiday from school working for free (job experience is the nice term!) in a ‘yard’ at Newmarket. I realised then that these youngsters were made to work physically very hard, very hard indeed, but Philip’s enthusiasm was undimmed, thus I allowed this ‘Dickensian ' exploitation to carry on.

Long hours were spent mucking out, cleaning boxes, feeding, hauling in bales of straw and hay, shaking out the straw, cleaning tack and riding out at some god-forsaken hour on a sturdy but very young ‘spooky’ horse if you were lucky, or quite probably some half-witted creature hell bent on destruction of itself and its minute and petrified rider. Then comes the rubbing down of the animal in its box and leaving it with its hay net. Possibly two or more horses would be so dealt with each morning. A long break would occur for lunch etc, followed by ‘evening stables’ where much as before would happen again.

Relief? One day a week off. Wages? A miserable pittance. Work conditions? Very high-risk assessment for serious injuries at all times.

There are very decent head lads in the industry, but it is not unusual (I witnessed this on at least three occasions) for this arduous labour to be accompanied by a flow of bawled out instructions from a power-crazed bully of a head lad (male or female), generously punctuated by unimaginably foul language. Thus there exists a ‘luck-of-the-draw’ situation in how these boys and girls are introduced to this noble profession.

This last sentence may be countered by it being claimed that (some) youngsters are trained at the much-vaunted ‘Racing School’ in Newmarket. The training will be helpful of course for the fortunate ones who are accepted there. However, it does not prepare for the rude awakening, of how it really is when working at a yard.

My views may be countered by the argument that this profession is not for weaklings. That I understand. I have worked with cattle, horses and other animals. Hard physical work always accompanies stockmanship. However, fair and appropriate working and welfare conditions are possible, and this is what the horseracing industry must address.

Living ‘accommodation’ is offered privately or in so-called hostels as provided by individual ‘yards’. These so-called ‘digs’ with a few significant exceptions to the rule were often simply pretty awful. On a first visit to Philip’s ‘digs’ in what outwardly appeared to be a pleasant house, I found the so-called lounge for four lads, to be the tiny third-floor landing area; it was January, unheated, draughty and therefore unbearably cold. It was a dark, windowless ‘Fagin’s den’, with cheap unclean furniture. A cheerless, soul-destroying, miserable hole of a place. God only knows how any thinking being could subject fellow humans to such squalor.

This grasping attitude was not untypical of landladies/landlords, coupled with the less than responsible attention of the trainer (boss) who had not ensured that his young charges were properly housed. No fundamental duty for the protection and well being of young employees was in place. Probably, the need for such a requirement was not even vaguely understood. Such is the ignorance that existed then about the most basic and minimum of welfare standards. In all probability, much such ignorance exists to this day.

The well-heeled grandees of the ‘industry’ sleeping in their warm and spacious mansions having better things on their minds.

Many years ago, horseracing recruited the smallest young lads of fourteen years old straight from school. Thus young horses barely formed themselves, would experience the lightest of weights on their very thin young backs. As the school leaving age crept up to sixteen years it became more difficult to find suitable small boys, thus the way has opened for girl stable ‘lads’ and apprentices. Thus the Heath during training gallops has witnessed bolting horses, out of control with a male or female rider desperately working at the reins in vain to halt the animal. Incidentally, there is nothing sexist about this, for a bolting horse is difficult for an experienced strong male to control. Considerable strength and experience is demanded to stop a runaway horse, a small youngster, boy or girl, will be at serious risk of injury in this situation, and indeed fatalities have happened and will happen again. If an apprentice develops effective riding skills then ‘rides’ will be offered for which a modest fee will be paid. The first ‘ride’ offered would probably be an all apprentice race. Once underway possibly some twenty-plus young hopefuls with varying experience would be whooping and hollering their way around the course, with possibly success for those with intelligence, nerves of steel and most importantly, those who happen to be riding the better horses. A few, only a very few, will go on to develop reasonable careers as journeyman jockeys, regularly getting rides and possibly some occasional winners, but they are statistically likely to produce more ‘placed’ results as they ride for smaller trainers with less wealthy owners. Thus the animals they ride will not be the best bred and have lesser chances of success when compared to the horses that are trained at top ‘yards’.

It has also occurred that a number of horses not fit for purpose have been (and possibly are still) entered in races, and it is these that the youngster will very probably have to ride, there being no other choice because the ‘big name’ jockeys will grab the best horses. (One famous jockey once told me he would “not ride some of the horses that Philip had ridden, because they were just bloody dangerous!” This says it all). Consequently, a barely capable animal will have to be nursed around the track. It is highly likely to slip and throw its young rider who is likely to finish up in hospital with concussion, broken collarbone etc or worse.

In my experience, following such an accident, neither the trainer nor owner of the horse bothered to visit or inquire about the condition of the rider.

Thus the lone parent (as I did) will then spend time at the hospital for up to three days or more waiting for decisive signs of recovery from the concussion. Eventual relief that all is well is strengthened by the knowledge that the medical people (jockey club doctor) will not allow a return to racing for at least fourteen days and then only after an all clear medical examination.

Elitism will favour a very few fortunate jockeys in horse racing, although their riding skills will be no better than those of any other competent rider. However ‘connections’ within the social hierarchy of the business will ensure that this privileged few will not only get a good number of rides but without a doubt the best quality rides.

A particularly unpleasant aspect of rider selection emerges here, and this is the not infrequent practice of being ‘jocked off’. 

This is described as follows: – An aspiring young apprentice manages to win with a horse maybe a couple of times or more. 

Although the horse has a modest background and was rated as an ‘outsider’ it has beaten more highly rated competition (both horse and rider).

The delight of the young rider will be obvious, and the rating of the horse will of course be elevated. The young rider who achieved the successes anticipates being booked to ride it again. Indeed this duly happens, however the establishment does not welcome this success. An aggrieved elite in the form of a ‘tally hunting’ famed jockey and his agent, induce the horse’s trainer and owner to ‘give’ the ride to them, thus ‘jocking off’ the youngster who had done so well. Some reward, for loyalty and hard work.

I have seen youngsters who have been so treated in tears. Hard won and competent success, achieved against all the odds, is only to be rewarded with vicious rejection because of greed. Grasping, self-centred and vicious jealousy only partly describes such actions. 

Of course, what is happening here is an example of supporting the maintenance of the status quo, thus ensuring by any means that the pecking order, the cash flow and the totalitarian control stays within the ‘on track’ and the ‘off track ‘ elite of vested interests.

The above shows that a ‘career structure’ as defined in normal business terms is non-existent in the racing industry. What exists is a dog eat dog state of affairs with at best only very limited and sparse consideration for reasonable standard procedures and conduct. As for more responsibilities, well there is little evidence for the existence of any being practised at all.

I mentioned earlier the difficulty of finding small, lightweight youngsters for the industry. Even if small enough initially it is almost certain that they will naturally grow taller and increase their weight. Thus the small sixteen-year-old apprentice and stable lad a couple of years later at eighteen will be fighting against body weight increase using the most bizarre and downright dangerous methods to do this.

For the stable lad getting too heavy could mean the loss of a job; for the aspiring apprentice it will certainly be the end of any chance of a flat racing career. Accelerated ‘sweating it out ‘ methods are used for rapid weight loss e.g. wearing a shell suit in the car with the heater on maximum output whilst driving to race meetings, inducing vomiting after eating normal food, experimenting with unknown diet weight loss supplements, saunas (if available), deliberate starving etc. I have seen an otherwise fit youngster in a ‘floating energy less state’ after such extreme treatments. God only knows what other damage was being caused to the body.

Most normal youngsters must grow to their potential, which is the nature of things. Thus to attempt to arrest this at a vulnerable stage is surely very dangerous. It is a criminal thing to allow it to continue in this supposedly enlightened time when health and safety can rule supreme with trivia, but in the urgent examples as given above apparently has nothing to say?

A move to National Hunt racing will allow higher weights for riders, however a 5 ft 10 inch man will be expected to maintain his/her weight at no more than 9-10 stones. That again will be difficult. The rider will need to be strong to take a much more mature horse over hurdles, hedges and ditches, thus there is the need for strength and energy and yet a demand to prevent weight gain, which for most involves again strict dieting along with weight-reducing methods similar to those described above.

National Hunt racing statistically involves a rider in an accident one race in ten. It is much more dangerous than motor racing. 

Bones will be broken and worse, Why then send people out to ride these horses fundamentally unfit? It can only be because the speed of the horse is directly related to the money it carries. Thus the rider only needs to be well enough and strong enough to get the animal around the track, the fact that he or she is seriously exhausted afterwards (although individual bravado will convey the opposite) is of little interest to owner, trainer or indeed punter.

In hindsight, I should have told the organisers of five years of memorial races at Sandown Park to take a running jump. 

These were staged by the industry so it could be seen to be aware of ‘their loss’. I suppose if I had insisted I could have mounted the stairs of the rostrum to assist presenting the prize to the winner. Smiling bravely, I would have accepted weak smiles and limp handshakes and inane remarks from peculiar men wearing camel coats and brown trilbies with titles like steward, ‘clerk of the course’ and president. In the event I stood at the rear of the collecting ring watching it all.

Come in to lunch they once said, this I did following 12 people most of whom claimed to be Philip’s friends and adopted family (the people who gave him digs, in return for riding/schooling dodgy horses???) It should really have been just his immediate real family. Yes come to lunch they said; however at the end of it guess who got left with the bill?