Christophe Soumillon: 'I made a mistake - next time, it never happens this way'

Christophe Soumillon has been successful in an appeal against the 12-day ban handed out for causing interference while celebrating his Coral-Eclipse win on Vadeni, a disciplinary panel having decided to reduce it to eight days.

Soumillon is now set to ride at Glorious Goodwood this month after his initial ban had ruled him out of the first two days.

The Belgian rider spoke passionately in his own defence during a two-hour hearing on Thursday and was frank in accepting his mistake in allowing Vadeni to drift right after crossing the line, squeezing both Native Trail and Lord North against the inside rail. But he pleaded for some understanding of his actions, having just ridden the first French-trained horse to win the Eclipse since 1960, which he described as a champagne moment for him.

"If it was a normal race, it will never happen, I will never celebrate like that," he said. "When you are a soccer player and you score in a World Cup final, you know you cannot take your shirt off. But somebody just does it. It's not normal but sometimes the pressure just splits out. It's like a champagne bottle, that's what I feel when I pass the line.

"It was maybe a second, a second and a half when I wasn't professional. But it wasn't on purpose, I don't think it was dangerous. For sure, it's quite impressive when you see the footage but both of the jockeys, both of the horses came back well."

Christophe Soumillon: 'I think this year you have 86 or 87 jockeys getting suspended and unfortunately I'm the top of the list'Credit: Alan Crowhurst (Getty Images)

Soumillon, who presented his own case without the help of a solicitor or agent, had evidently done some research as he sought to put his ban in context. "There is a lot of racing in the UK every day," he noted. "I think this year you have 86 or 87 jockeys getting suspended and unfortunately I'm the top of the list.

"I'm the jockey with the biggest suspension in the UK this season. So that's why I feel a bit sad about that and that's why I'm appealing because a lot of people are talking about it and they say that's very severe for somebody who didn't do it on purpose.

"There is a big competitive thing between UK and France and we all know it's going to be there for life. And we love the sport. I didn't come over to try to interfere with someone and do my job 90 per cent. I try to do it 100 per cent."

Soumillon won some favour with the panel by promising not to celebrate in such a fashion again and added: "For sure, after the line, something goes wrong. You can understand and believe that I will never celebrate any more like I did. I always learn from my lessons.

"I rode in more than 20 countries in the world, I won in nearly all of them and I never get such a ban. The suspension is probably the hardest I had in my whole career."

'We detected significant remorse'

Delivering the verdict, panel chairman James O'Mahony said: "Generally, of course, M. Soumillon is a much-respected horseman and jockey and he addressed us with courtesy and realism as to accepting what he had done that was wrong and we detected significant remorse.

"No-one has argued that anyone should be punished for celebration. It's a living sport and people experience joy and pleasure from watching it. An emotional response is involved and, as Leonard Cohen once said, joy has a habit of breaking through.

"But there is in this case a very significant safety risk. Irresponsible, careless riding risks the health and safety of horses and riders. Mercifully, nobody went down and there were no injuries."

He said Soumillon deserved credit for not disputing he had made a mistake, and for checking with the trainers of both horses in the subsequent days to make sure neither had been injured.

"If someone faces up to what they've done, it reduces the risk of such behaviour occurring in future," O'Mahony said. He concluded that the stewards' decision to suspend Soumillon for 12 days was "too severe".

Soumillon: I will take care next time

"It's great news," Soumillon said as he drove from Deauville to Longchamp, where he is to ride on Thursday evening.

"To be honest, it's not going to change many things. But at the end of the day I'm just happy to see the judge thought I wasn't so bad at that moment.

"I made a mistake. It could have been much worse but finally nobody gets hurt. I don't want to give a bad image to my sport and put my colleagues in trouble."

Soumillon has a single ride in mind that he expects to get back as a result of the reduced suspension, aboard Lady Princess in the Qatar International Stakes, a valuable race for Arab horses on the second day of Glorious Goodwood. Lady Princess took first prize of £226,000 under Oisin Murphy in the race last year.

He clarified that he would continue to celebrate important wins, but would not lose himself in the moment to the same extent.

"I will take care more, next time. I always love to celebrate when I win a big race and that's part of me when I cross the line, I need to release some happiness from what I'm feeling on the horse and sometimes the crowd really like it. But I'm going to make sure, next time, it never happens this way."

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