Weighing in after the race

[banacek]

I am curious to what the rules are for jocks getting on the scale after the race. Seems to me when I was a kid, the jocks came off the horse, jumped on the scale. The guy monitoring the scale would wave at the judges and then it was official. I seem to recall (very rare) instances where the horse would be disqualified because the jock was under the listed weight..forgot a 5 lb weight or something.

Some tracks I watch, the race is official and the horses are still running back from the backstretch. At others it seems to take forever to get an official. Maybe it varies by jurisdiction?

[andymays]

From Bad Beat thread post #1

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Have you ever been disqualifed because the Jockey on your Horse weighed out light? I had it happen to me.

To the best of my memory Allijeba never came close to any other Horse during the race and won at 11-1. The last thing I expected was an inquiry and when it went up I thought it was for another Horse who finished in the money. It lasted forever and I have pasted a link below and the exerpt pertaining to the incident.

I have had many "bad beats" but this is my worst!

Link no good!
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/artic...30/SP174197.DTL

Exerpt regarding Ricky Frazier and Allijeba:

But he left after a bizarre incident in the $250,000 Final Fourteen Championship -- the culmination of a series of races around the nation -- on Oct. 14, 1990, at Bay Meadows. Frazier won the race aboard Allijeba by a nose over Tex's Zing, but his mount was disqualified because he weighed out with his saddle at 123 pounds -- three fewer than the horse was assigned to carry.

The Bay Meadows board of stewards suspended Frazier for six months, but he went to court to fight the decision, and the penalty was reduced to probation.

Frazier still has no idea how the discrepancy happened, because he weighed in at the correct 126 pounds before the race.

"I didn't have access to the saddle from when I weighed in until I got on the horse," he said. "It never made sense to me. The trainer (Larry Robideaux) and I lost our share of the purse earnings -- about $14,000 each. You wouldn't jeopardize that when you know that the first five finishers in the race get weighed out."

The appearance of impropriety sent Frazier packing.

"It was a big embarrassment to have that cloud over my name," he said. "I went to Texas, where they opened some new tracks (Sam Houston and Retama parks), and I was leading rider there for a few years," Frazier said. "I rode at Delaware Park the past two years."

[Greyfox]

I am curious to what the rules are for jocks getting on the scale after the race. Seems to me when I was a kid, the jocks came off the horse, jumped on the scale. The guy monitoring the scale would wave at the judges and then it was official. I seem to recall (very rare) instances where the horse would be disqualified because the jock was under the listed weight..forgot a 5 lb weight or something.

Some tracks I watch, the race is official and the horses are still running back from the backstretch. At others it seems to take forever to get an official. Maybe it varies by jurisdiction?

Good question banacek.
Recently I've seen some tracks even have the prices up before the horses
are back or barely back.

[LA Racing Lady]

I was a racing official for over 10 years, mostly in Louisiana, and never was a horse disqualified for the jockey weighing in light. In fact, the only time that I ever heard of that happening was with Rickey Frazier in the above mentioned post.

A few years ago, tracks started going to a "quick official" where if one of the jockeys plan on claiming a foul, they must tell an outrider while pulling up. If noone has a foul, the race is made official by the stewards, without the weighing in of any of the jockeys. I think that they are weighed in after unsaddling, and if there is anything amiss, there is a disqualification by order of the stewards with a loss of purse money, but it does not affect the mutuel payout. Just like a positive post race drug test.

But, in Louisiana, we usually have to worry about the jockeys being overweight, not weighing in lighter than required :bang:

[Imriledup]

There's a reason that America doesn't have a digital scale.

Think about it.

[Space Monkey]

I think this practice might have something to do with the perceived need for speeding up the race card. The length of time between races is a constant criticism of the casual player. I abhor it. Every jock should be weighed out before the race is official. Treating it like a post race positive is just plain wrong IMO.

[HUSKER55]

Jost curious, what would be the advantage to weighing in after a race on a sloppy track? You know the weight won't match.

[startngate]

Jost curious, what would be the advantage to weighing in after a race on a sloppy track? You know the weight won't match.Even on dry tracks, jockeys can still pick up some track material so they will usually weigh heavier after the race. More so on sloppy or muddy days.

The Clerk of Scales is essentially trying to catch a jockey weighing in too light after the race. Mainly it would be through a lighter jockey discarding the lead weights put in a saddle pad which are used to get them up to a certain weight, or using a heavy saddle to weigh in and switching it out before the the horse is tacked up. A good clerk of scales will also investigate if the jockey weighs in overweight if the variance is too high, but that rarely happens.