It’s been a rocky few years for the assorted weirdos of the horse racing industry, but today the quest to clean up their image begins with the release of Amazon doc Horsepower.
Among its stars: jockey Oisin Murphy, who appears while serving a ban for a positive cocaine test.
Oisin has always insisted he doesn’t do drugs, and claims he accidentally absorbed the coke during “sexual contact with a user”.
As excuses go, it’s up there with “I slipped, fell and landed arse-first on a ketchup bottle”, but somehow it worked and he got his ban cut in half.
No word on whether Horsepower will cover Oisin’s subsequent return to the saddle, which saw him crowned Champion jockey, headbutt a bloke in the pub, and fail a pre-race breathalyser test all in the same week.
He’s currently serving a 14 month ban for that last offence, which should leave plenty of time free for filming series two.
On Monday, we showed you a photo of two gents who brought a candelabra for their picnic at Royal Ascot.
We contrasted it with tailgating, an American pre-match tradition where rednecks barbecue meat and turn their pick up trucks into makeshift jacuzzis while guzzling down revolting drinks in red plastic cups.
See above for photos of both.
We asked you which you’d prefer: Tailgating or Quailgating. Now the results are in, and it’s a dead heat between the Candelabra-wielding softies and the rednecks stuffing their faces with BBQ while knee deep in slurry.
But neither were as popular as dragging your genitals through broken glass.
While we’re on the topic of posh picnics at sports events, The Upshot once had the misfortune to attend the sailing regatta Cowes Week, where we overheard a ruddy-faced, gout-ridden old toff yell, “You can shag my daughter and bugger my son, but never cut the nose off my brie“.
True story.
Never a dull moment for Oisin Murphy, who started the week headbutting a bloke in a pub car park and finished it as this season’s champion jockey.
Witnesses say the Irishman, recently back from a six month cocaine ban, threatened then assaulted a bloodstock agent in Newmarket.
The victim gave his side of the story in a voice note:
I’m a bit shaken. I was chatting to a few pals in the pub and he comes up to me and goes ‘I don’t like you’ and smashes me with a glass in the face.It was a plastic glass thank god so there wasn’t too much damage. I went and tidied myself up and said to one of my pals let’s get out of here.
As I walked out, one of the guys I was with said we have to get him to apologise. I said fuck that guy apologising, and he came up to me and headbutted me.
Owsh failed a breathalyser test and wasn’t allowed to race the next day, which is unsurprising given he was so drunk he tried to glass someone with a plastic cup. That sort of sloppiness would never have happened in his cocaine days.
Anyway, a week later he was back in the saddle, riding to victory and ensuring he finishes this season as the top jockey. Swings and roundabouts.
