red light: a signal to stop.

​In what universe is yellow, even fluorescent yellow, the colour associated with the cessation of movement? If the B.H.A. were given the task of managing our road network it would doubtless remove red from traffic lights and replace it with a warm shade of fuzzy yellow, with a hazard flag replacing amber.
Personally, I exonerate the clerk of the course at Sandown, I also pour no scorn on the stewards who eventually voided the London National and suspended seven jockey, even if they demonstrated no concern for the problems their action will cause trainers and owners come Boxing Day. The blame for the fiasco lies one-hundred-per-cent at the door of the B.H.A. As someone said, there are L.E.D. advertising boards all about the racecourse, yet in this modern age the B.H.A. seem to believe a man with a flag, on this occasion a static flag, is suitable for relaying the message that the race is to stopped.
Let’s be honest, here. No one at Sandown could have foreseen or prepared for what occurred on Saturday, and the bend into the straight was the worst possible part of the course for any incident to happen. But the reason the race was halted where it was halted was because at that point there happened to be the recall flags used by the man tasked with stopping the race if the starter called a false start. As Neil Mulholland quite rightly said: they should have stopped the race a minute and a half earlier than they chose to, or could do with the procedure the B.H.A. insists upon. What if a horse had fallen and suffered a fatal injury or a jockey was badly injured at one of the fences in the back straight? As the clerk of the course and the stewards knew the race would have to be voided, they could be accused of putting protocol before the health and safety of both horse and jockey. Expediency in such cases should be the first concern, and that applies also to the stewards’ inquiry and getting the voided verdict out to the public.
One of the more sensible solutions to help remedy the problem is the idea to place warning lights in each fence. Easier to accomplish with a fence than a hurdle but a suggestion worth looking into. What colour will the light be? Red, of course. The main problem with this possible solution might be a horse injuring itself if it came into contact with whatever material the light is manufactured from. If anyone got a glimpse of the damage Vintage Clouds did to the Chair fence at Aintree on Saturday you would understand my reticence at a light situated in the fence.
Given the number of vehicles that follow a race I did wonder if the lead car could have bells and whistles, or some sort of microphone or megaphone or L.E.D. light system, that could get ahead of the runners to direct jockeys to pull up. We live in a world where it is possible to switch on central heating from your place of work and where a vehicle on the Moon or even Mars can be directed from a control centre on Earth. Yet the best the B.H.A. can do to stop a horse race is a man with a yellow flag.
Incidentally, I was little annoyed over the weekend that the fiasco of the voided race was being given precedence over the tragic death of Houblon Des Obeaux, one of my favourite horses. No horse deserves to suffer a heart attack mid-race, as indeed in a perfect world no horse should lose their life in pursuit of our enjoyment, but Houblon Des Obeaux particularly didn’t deserve such an epitaph. Died in battle may should heroic, even laudable, and at least he didn’t suffer as horses with fractured limbs must do, but the honour he brought to those who cared for him and about him should have allowed him, if there were such an entity as a god of equines, a full and active life followed by the ease of a retirement spent at his leisure. But that is the world in which we choose to vicariously live.