Sir Mark Todd

NEWMARKET, UK -- The two-year-old racing and sales sector has become an increasingly expanding element of the racing world in general, but the practice of training horses at the age of two has been put under the microscope in Germany.  A revision of German animal welfare laws means that it is now illegal to train or compete with horses younger than 30 months of age, though Thoroughbred racing is currently exempt from this law while a behavioural study is undertaken and eventually assessed by parliament. Around 60 delegates from Europe...

Sir Mark Todd, who had been placed in an interim suspension by the British Horseracing Authority (BHA) on Feb. 16, received a four-month suspension, with two months deferred, following a BHA independent disciplinary panel hearing on Thursday. Todd had been charged with conduct prejudicial to the reputation of racing in February, after a video emerged on social media of him striking a horse with a branch in August of 2020. The 65-year-old had been knighted in 2013 for his services to equestrian sport. Although Todd issued an apology, his licence...

The British Horseracing Authority (BHA) has placed an interim suspension on the licence of trainer Sir Mark Todd following the publication over the weekend of a video showing him striking a horse with a branch for refusing at a water obstacle. Investigations are ongoing into the circumstances surrounding the events depicted in the video made two years ago during a cross-country clinic at which Todd was teaching. Until that process is complete Todd will be unable to enter horses to race in Britain.  A statement released by the BHA on...

Dual Olympic gold medal-winning equestrian and licensed trainer Sir Mark Todd has become the subject of much criticism after a video showing him repeatedly striking a horse with a tree branch emerged on social media. The video, from 2020, shows the New Zealand native striking a reluctant horse some 10 times when it baulked at a water crossing. "I wholeheartedly apologise to the horse and all involved for my actions in this video clip," Todd said in a statement. "One of the main things I preach is about establishing a...

When we wrapped up last Flat season, the lofty assumption was that by the start of this new one we would be back to some semblance of normality. How wrong could we have been? After a brutal winter, the pandemic is only now easing to the point where a limited number of owners were permitted to attend racecourses in England and Scotland from yesterday (Monday).  There are not too many areas within racing in which Britain is ahead of Ireland or France—witness the Irish domination of the Cheltenham Festival and...