Getting Caught Up, Saturday's Tilts and Whipping Rule Fun

I was out and about tonight and it is a shame I missed the action at the M. It sounds like there was some dandy racing. I will get caught up on replays ASAP.

My Cup pick - Barber Pole - Greg informs me, stunk today. He was beaten by a George Teague fourth stringer. But looking at the line I still have him as my pick. He had to have been sick to come home in 29.1. I am pretty sure he will bounce back fine.

The 500k Upper Canada Cup elims also went on tonight in Barrie. The news is here.

I am getting caught up on some other news as well and I must say the driver commentary on the whipping rules is getting pretty hilarious. The sport of racing is comical (not unlike other sports; NFL safeties hated when clotheslining was outlawed, for example) - if you change one thing and ask people to do something differently than they have been, they get kind of cranky. The latest, Maritime driver Gilles Barrieau:

Due to that, Barrieau – a winner of over 3,000 races lifetime – says he’s giving up driving other people’s horses and he’s just going to drive the 12 horses he trains himself.

"I’m just not interested anymore. I come across the wire with a loose line and they nail me $50 so I am just not doing it anymore. It’s not that I don’t like (driving) but I just don’t like going out on account of that. I used to have fun doing it but it’s getting so it’s not. It’s no fun."

On the Saturday, May 9 race card at Exhibition Park, Barrieau would normally be driving in every race, but did he drive at all?

"Nope," Barrieau said. "That’s the reason really and I don’t miss it one bit. Until they change (the rule) I’m just not interested."

I hope Mr. Barrieau realizes that there will always be someone else to take the drives (and money) that he will be giving up.

The comments are even getting kind of comical, too.

Jack, we don't really need to do much further investigation into this incident to know what's happening. Here's what's happening: Gilles Barrieau, among many others, has had enough!

Cue the violins.

It is commonplace to see harness insiders grasp at the past, until you pry it out of their hands. It is why the business cannot police itself, or why we can not let us as participants run it. We need a commissioner, just like in other sports leagues, to tell Gilles and the rest who choose to not play by this rule, that if they do not there is one choice for them only: find another line of work.