Can we Trust the British Horseracing Authority as a Truly Independent Regulator

Trusting the British Horseracing Authority (BHA) to function as an independent regulator is a bit like asking Prince Andrew to chair a Women’s Safety Committee. It’s structurally implausible, comically conflicted, and morally suspect.

Let’s start with the ownership. The BHA is 50% owned by the very racecourses it's meant to regulate. That’s not independence; that’s a polite hostage situation dressed in pinstripes. Imagine the Financial Conduct Authority being co-owned by hedge funds, or Ofsted being chaired by a coalition of failing headteachers and geography supply teachers on sabbatical. The BHA is effectively trying to referee a match it also placed a cheeky fiver on—and not-so-secretly owns one of the teams.

In a sport where jockeys are handed bans for an offensive tweet, a mistimed whip strike, or inadvertently missing a flag at a fog-bound Ffos Las, one might reasonably expect that a senior official admitting to manipulating official data would be facing a fate more severe than a gentle wrist slap and a sternly worded “lessons learned” PDF.

And yet, here we are.

James Sanderson, Thirsk’s Clerk of the Course and CEO—a dual role that makes conflict of interest not so much a risk as a daily ritual—has admitted via a Barstewards videocast, with the sort of blasé candour usually reserved for people who’ve never been challenged, to deliberately altering a GoingStick reading. And not only did he tweak the numbers, but he also blithely asserted it was “common practice” among his colleagues across the country.

Let’s pause on that. Common practice. Widespread, routine, accepted.

This isn’t one rogue operator going off piste in pursuit of perfection. This is racing’s equivalent of Dieselgate—where the instruments are real, but the readings are as fictional as a handicapper’s objectivity on Gold Cup day.

The Slippery Slope from 'Going Good' to 'Integrity Questionable'

We are told, endlessly, that the GoingStick is a scientific instrument. It's been mandatory since 2007, with readings used by punters, trainers, and broadcasters alike. It gives us numbers, not vibes. It's supposed to offer a consistent, unbiased measure of ground conditions—because “Good to Soft” means nothing if the course clerk’s “Soft” is another’s “Basically Hard With Bits.”

But Sanderson, with the candour of a man who’s either exceptionally honest or has nothing left to lose, said on record that he altered the figure to better reflect what he felt was fair.

And now, the British Horseracing Authority (BHA), that half-owned regulatory poodle, has launched a review. Not a ruling, not an immediate sanction—just a chin-stroking pause while they wait for the social media storm to pass and hope the Racing Post gets distracted by a photogenic foal in Newmarket.

The People Board: Watching the Workforce While the House Burns

Now, the BHA has spent the last few years proudly touting the creation of the People Board, a body ostensibly designed to support and safeguard the racing workforce. You’d think, therefore, that the manipulation of official ground data —data that informs jockey decisions, horse entries, and betting markets—might warrant their immediate and unequivocal intervention.

But what has the People Board said? What has the BHA said, beyond the stock “review pending” line that now seems to accompany every scandal like an uninvited dinner guest? Anything on peddling in the urinals too? Maybe they should hold their next meeting in a racecourse toilets?

Nothing. At least, nothing of substance.

Because here’s the real scandal: racing’s administrators are more comfortable punishing jockeys for colourful language than confronting the structural rot within their own system. A jockey swears on Twitter? Ban. A clerk alters nationwide ground readings with impunity? Let’s not rush to judgement.

It’s the hypocrisy that really stings. In a sport still touting its love of “discipline” and “respect for the rules,” it turns out the biggest rule-benders wear suits and attend stakeholder engagement seminars, not breeches and body protectors.

What Should the Penalty Be? Try Consistency for Starters

Let’s talk consequences.

If a jockey mistakenly misjudges a finish and causes interference, they can be banned for days—losing rides, income, and reputation. If they’re found guilty of overuse of the whip, it’s front-page news in the Racing Post and a YouTube thumbnail before the stewards have even finished their digestives.

And yet a course clerk manipulates an objective measurement system, admits to it publicly, and casually implicates many of his fellow clerks... and we’re left waiting for a committee review that will probably conclude sometime after the next rail strike.

To be blunt: if Sanderson escapes with anything less than a serious suspension, a public reprimand, and mandatory retraining, then the BHA has effectively declared open season on objectivity. At this point, clerks might as well use dowsing rods, and ground reports could be replaced with tarot cards—"The Going is: Mercurial, with a hint of betrayal."

Trust Erodes Quietly. And Then All at Once.

The problem isn’t just that this happened. It’s that Sanderson’s admission was met, not with shock, but with a weary nod from racing insiders who have long suspected that the game behind the game is full of nudges, winks, and unspoken arrangements.

Because in British racing, the ground is “good” when it needs to be, the clerk is a cheerleader in tweed, and the regulator is half-owned by the people it’s meant to regulate.

But this time, the truth has slipped out. It wasn’t leaked. It wasn’t discovered. It was confessed—not under duress, but as part of casual, podcast banter. That’s how normalised this manipulation has become: a light anecdote between sips of coffee and betting tips.

If this doesn’t trigger wholesale reform of how going data is collected, published, and audited, then racing might as well give up the pretence and sell sponsorship rights for the GoingStick to Love Island.

Disrepute Has Already Arrived, And It’s Wearing a Thirsk Lanyard

Let’s not mince words. If what Sanderson has said is true—and to date, he’s shown no sign of retracting it—then racing has already been brought into disrepute. Not through malice, but through cavalier normalisation. Through a shrugging culture where bending the truth is justified if it makes the optics neater.

Because when one clerk admits to massaging figures, how many more are doing the same? How long before a trainer pulls a horse because the going changed post-declaration, and suddenly the stewards are playing detective, scrutinising a system built on wobbly foundations?

And don’t think this ends at going reports. If data can be altered to “reflect raceability,” what stops someone from trimming the official race distance to suit entries? Or quietly overlooking a minor safety breach to keep a meeting running and the bars open? At this point, one suspects even the photo-finish technology might be subject to a creative re-interpretation depending on who’s paying for the hospitality suite.

Conclusion: Racing’s House of Cards Is Built on Sand and Self-Deception

When the clerks are cooking the data, the loos are still medieval, and the People Board is too busy planning its next diversity workshop to notice the structural failures piling up at the paddock gate, what hope is there?

Racing doesn’t need more mission statements. It needs independent oversight. It needs racecourse accountability. And it needs to stop pretending that “modernisation” is about fonts and hashtags, rather than toilets, turf, and truth.

Because if Sanderson’s version of events is accurate, then racing has already been brought into disrepute. The question now isn’t whether the BHA can save face. It’s whether it can survive this slow collapse of credibility—or if, like a weak fence at Plumpton, it’ll collapse under the slightest pressure and leave nothing but splinters and blame.

Would you like a follow-up satirical piece written from the fictional perspective of a course clerk defending these practices—perhaps titled “In Defence of Dodgy Data: Confessions of a Turf Whisperer”?