Rust: I’m pleased people are taking such interest in our sport

BHA chief executive Nick Rust has not been surprised at the impact racing’s equine flu crisis has made in the wider media and hopes some good might even come of it.

He said on Tuesday: "Despite the fact we sometimes get a bit down on ourselves, our sport is part of British culture.

"Nine million people a month have a bet on British racing and six million was the total attendance on racecourses last year, making racing the second most highly attended sport.

"We have 60 racecourses throughout the country and we're part of the rural economy. There are more than 400 phrases in connection with racing in general that are used in the common language. It’s part of our culture."

Equine Flu: put racing on hold

He added: "The situation was obviously of concern and we were having to answer questions from day one as to whether this could affect humans, and things like that. In a way I’m pleased people are taking such interest in our sport.

"Hopefully we can come out of this clear and with a bit of momentum. We obviously wouldn’t have wished this to have happened, but I think you have to take every opportunity and use it in the right way."

Asked how he viewed the way the climate changed over the six days, from widespread support of the mandatory shutdown throughout the industry to increasing criticism, he replied: "Of course we listened, and of course we were interested in what people had to say, but we had to do what we thought was best.

"This is our role. This is what we are charged with, and frankly, with 20 vets on board, with 60 or 70 former racing staff, the BHA, contrary to some of the criticism we have seen, has racing through it like a stick of rock. We love British racing."

"Of course there’s going to be criticism, because people want to get back racing, but let’s put one thing to bed: the fact that it’s argued that this [equine flu] is prevalent in all yards most of the time has been put to sleep by the testing we’ve done – several thousand tests and only ten positives," he added.

"This is not what you see in the yards regularly. This is something that can potentially kill horses if they have not been vaccinated properly or recently, so we have to make sure we look after this properly.

"That was the first thought, and the second was that we get racing back up and running as unaffected as possible for the short and medium term."

Rust was unable to say what the cost of the shutdown might have been to the sport as a whole, but estimated it was "several million pounds a day, probably."

Putting the loss of fixtures into perspective, however, he added: "The issue here is that we’ve lost 23 meetings in six days, but last year we lost 80 in total through weather issues.

"Nobody wants to lose racing, but first and foremost we wanted to make sure we were not taking a risk that might impact upon racing for a hell of a lot longer and have significant long-term impact."

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