“It’s just beyond a joke”: McDonald calls for drastic changes to the handicap system

Champion jockey James McDonald believes the handicap system needs to change for Australia’s great races.

Too often superstar jockeys aren’t competing in great handicap races like the Melbourne & Caulfield Cups as well as the Metropolitan and Epsom Handicap due to their inability to make the weights given by the handicapper.

Look at a race like the Melbourne Cup this year where a horse like Vauban will likely be allocated the top weight of 55.5kgs which means the remaining 23 runners will likely race at weights of 54.5kgs or less.

Considering the great riders in this country are all on the heavier side, McDonald believes it creates a weaker brand as big races won’t have the best jockeys riding in them.

Imagine a race like the Melbourne Cup without McDonald, Mark Zahra, Blake Shinn, Ben Melham or Nash Rawiller.

Given the state of racing, plans must be put in place to promote the industry's stars and the jockeys are an integral part of brand promotion.

If the current handicap system doesn’t change, McDonald says we’ll see jockeys pushing their bodies to the absolute limit to try and get their weights down and that leaves us in a very precarious situation as the safety debate rears its ugly head.

“I think it’s farcical with what’s happening, it’s just beyond a joke,” McDonald told SENTrack.

“We all know that when these top weights get allocated half of them aren’t running anyway as there’s something amiss or they aren’t even in heading towards the race.

“Those horses then come out and the weights for some reason don’t shift and I just don’t understand why there can’t be a top weight of 57kgs across the board.

“It makes it tough when you have a look at all the premiership jockeys and you go through the likes of Mark Zahra, Ben Melham, Nash Rawiller, Tommy Berry, James Orman, Blake Shinn, especially in this year's Melbourne Cup with Vauban likely the top weight with 55kgs and then you’ve got a Place Du Carrousel at 54kgs.

“All us heavy jockeys are probably happy to push the envelope to an extent and as much as we can in a Melbourne Cup, Caulfield Cup, a Metropolitan or an Epsom but to have five runners to choose from and half of them won’t even turn up makes it very difficult for our great races.

“It becomes a health issue as if a lot of jockeys their minimum is 53kgs but there’s only a handful of opportunities at 53kgs so they push themselves to get to 52kgs, then you’re getting very dehydrated jockeys absolutely at their minimum and we’ve seen examples of that during the Sydney Carnival where a couple of riders went down during the day.

“We’re all pushing our bodies to the absolute max as it is so the handicap just doesn’t seem right at the moment.”

2022 Melbourne Cup winner Gold Trip, with McDonald in the saddle, carried the top weight of 58.5kgs last year with Alenquer and Without A Fight rounding out the top three in the weights at 56.5kgs.

18 horses in last year's cup carried 53.5kgs or less.

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