Going Gone: Racing’s Integrity Sinks in the Soft at Thirsk

In the quaint world of British horseracing — where "Yarkshirism" still carries moral authority and a weather forecast can move millions — one might expect that data used to describe track conditions would be treated with something approaching scientific seriousness. After all, horses are withdrawn, trainers recalibrate, and punters stake life savings based on the official “going.” The British Horseracing Authority (BHA), in its infinite wisdom, even rolled out the GoingStick — a sort of turf thermometer for those who like their deception numerically calibrated — to ensure the ground’s firmness wasn’t left to some elderly clerk sticking his thumb into the soil like a sommelier sniffing cork.

But here we are. In December 2025, after James Sanderson — Thirsk’s Clerk of the Course and a self-styled agronomic shaman — admitted not only to falsifying GoingStick readings, but to doing so with the casual brazenness of a man reporting a bus delay, the BHA responded with all the urgency of a sloth on diazepam, 7 months being a "fastrack process". A £500 fine. No suspension. No integrity warning. No compulsory training. Not even a mild rebuke about bringing the sport into disrepute. Just a politely phrased hope that he might consider behaving next time.

This, remember, from a body that delights in chucking the book at jockeys for overuse of the whip or weighing out their KitKat. Yet when one of their own publicly confesses to data manipulation that undermines the entire basis of going reports, we get the regulatory equivalent of a gentle cough and a request to please consider using the equipment properly. If nothing else, it confirms a long-held suspicion: the BHA is less a regulator and more a chummy syndicate of racecourse execs pretending to police each other in exchange for biscuits and plausible deniability.

"I don't like the GoingStick" – the sport’s new standard of compliance

Let’s be very clear about what Sanderson did. This wasn't an unfortunate misreading, a technical failure, or some momentary lapse in procedural rigour. It was, by his own account, a deliberate substitution. He took an actual GoingStick reading — 8.6, suggesting ‘good to firm’ — and submitted 7.6, to make it appear more like ‘good’. Why? Because he didn’t trust the equipment. Or, more honestly, he trusted his own gut more than a calibrated device.

On its own, that’s enough to get most professionals — engineers, pilots, surgeons — sacked or struck off. Imagine a radiologist saying, “The scan said tumour, but my hunch said indigestion, so I binned the results.” That’s not interpretation; that’s sabotage.

But Sanderson went further. In a podcast — because of course the confession had to be podcasted, as is now mandatory for all modern malfeasance — he admitted he’d been doing this for years. That he actively avoided using the GoingStick. That many other clerks also ignore it or adjust readings to “match the chart.” In other words, the GoingStick system isn’t just occasionally undermined. It’s structurally irrelevant — a pantomime of measurement, a ritual to be performed, like opening Parliament with a golden mace or asking the BBC to be impartial.

And the BHA’s response? A £500 “fast-track” fine, agreed in advance with Sanderson as part of a plea deal so anaemic it makes the Post Office look draconian by comparison. The Judicial Panel’s own findings note the breach was “deliberate” and sustained, yet commend his “candour” and “cooperation” — the way one might praise an arsonist for politely opening the fire brigade’s gate.

What’s the point of having rules if they can be edited in real time?

At the heart of this farce lies a deeper rot: the myth of “integrity” in horse racing. The BHA insists that accurate going descriptions are “vital to maintaining public confidence.” That was their line in March 2025 when they suddenly rediscovered the GoingStick and sent a stern letter reminding clerks to use it. But when one openly admits to manipulating data — and implies many others do the same — the BHA crumbles into bureaucratic mush. The truth? Integrity is not an inviolable principle. It’s a marketing slogan, selectively enforced.

Rule (J)24.2 — the one Sanderson breached — prohibits “providing inaccurate information to the BHA.” It exists to stop exactly this kind of falsification. Because if clerks are allowed to reverse-engineer numbers to match subjective opinion, the entire data system collapses. No trend analysis. No credible records. No objective baseline. Just a guessing game dressed up in numerical drag.

But instead of treating Sanderson’s conduct as a serious threat to regulatory infrastructure, the BHA treated it as a one-man misunderstanding. His disdain for the GoingStick — which he hasn’t used properly in years — was not viewed as negligence but as an aesthetic preference. Like choosing tweed over Gore-Tex. Never mind that he refused training, ignored protocols, and encouraged others to do likewise. What mattered, apparently, was that he was nice about it when caught.

The fox is managing the henhouse — and the hens are paying rent

The BHA’s supine response doesn’t just reflect weak enforcement — it exposes a conflict of interest so profound it makes the term “regulator” feel like satire. Because what few outside the racing bubble realise is this: the BHA doesn’t just regulate racecourses — it is part-owned by them. The Racecourse Association (RCA), which represents the very people clerks like Sanderson work for, is a major stakeholder in the BHA.

This is not some hypothetical “appearance of bias.” It is structural. Financial. Political. The body tasked with enforcing integrity on racecourses is partially governed by the same interests it is meant to police. That’s like Ofsted being part-funded by the schools it inspects. Or HMRC having a shareholder meeting with the Cayman Islands.

So when clerks fudge data or course executives cut corners, is it any wonder the regulator adopts the tone of a polite butler rather than a watchdog? The power dynamic is not regulatory — it’s familial. The BHA doesn’t control racecourses; it placates them. It negotiates with them. It worries about “upsetting relationships” and “industry confidence.” This isn’t oversight. It’s corporate Stockholm Syndrome.

This is why a decade of GoingStick non-enforcement was never seen as a failure of oversight. It was quiet collusion — a mutual agreement not to make a fuss. Clerks could ignore the rules, the BHA could pretend they didn’t notice, and everyone could go on drinking weak coffee in stewardship meetings pretending data integrity was alive and well.

So is the BHA fit for purpose?

The evidence suggests not. It is difficult to see how a regulator that rewards frank admission of systemic cheating with a wrist-slap is capable of protecting the sport's integrity. By failing to impose meaningful sanctions — and by tolerating open defiance of its own standards — the BHA signals that its rules are optional, its authority conditional, and its devotion to data utterly performative. If Sanderson had manipulated betting markets rather than moisture readings, he’d be banned, pilloried, and named in Parliament. But because the deception occurred in the leafy, soggy realm of turf measurement — and because it involved a popular old hand rather than a faceless villain — it gets buried beneath euphemisms and fast-track leniency.

The BHA needs to decide: is it a regulator or a racecourse concierge service? Because right now, its actions say the latter. And if it continues on this path — where objective data can be quietly rewritten, and misconduct greeted with polite tolerance — then it might as well bin the GoingStick, stop pretending to be a 21st-century sport, and just go back to declaring the going as “somewhere between damp and delusional.” Because right now, the only thing firm in this industry is the handshake that says, “Don’t worry, old boy — we’ll sort it quietly.”

And so, a hearty thanks must go to the Barstewards podcast — the inadvertent investigative journalism unit the BHA never saw coming — for coaxing out this confession not with subpoenas or audits, but with a microphone and a pint. Without that episode, we’d still be living under the illusion that the going was measured with scientific impartiality, rather than guessed at by a man with a stick and a hunch.

Also due credit to the Anti Gambling Zarb Cousin–sponsored event at Thirsk — a venue so committed to “subjective going” it may soon replace the GoingStick with tea leaves, ouija boards, or the vibrations of a staff member’s knees. Their role in this pantomime has been nothing short of genre-defining: Fawlty Towers meets Yes Minister, with a side order of turf. With friends like these, who needs regulators?