Answers Wanted
Now that the first shock over the news that 11 Godolphin racehorses turned up positive for steroids in out-of-competition testing conducted by the British Horseracing Authority has passed, Greg Wood has questions:
Assuming that Zarooni was not creeping around the yard after midnight with a rucksack full of syringes, who was helping him? Was a vet — who would fall outside the licensing authority of the BHA — involved, as was the case with Nicky Henderson and the Moonlit Path affair in 2009? And who was supplying the steroids for what was, even if it was inadvertent, such a significant doping programme? Where were the drugs stored and who knew that they were there? How many other horses have been given steroids at Moulton Paddocks since Zarooni took charge in 2010?
All the questions are hugely embarrassing for Sheikh Mohammed. “I have made a catastrophic error,” said trainer Mahmood al-Zarooni. You can read his words as an admission of ignorance, or betrayal.
2:30 PM Addendum: “For Sheikh Mohammed, the mortification could not have been greater had they found a fridge full of cobra venom.”
