Chris Cook: what's the right thing to do with a doping tipoff?

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Danny Brock is in the mood to lash out at authority figures in racing. Recently banned from the sport for 15 years, a verdict which may have implications for his work in greyhound racing, he wants to share details of an incident which he feels shows his persecutors at the BHA in a poor light, concerning the 2017 doping of a horse called Murdanova.

You may feel that, having been found guilty of corruption, Brock is in the worst possible position to be criticising anyone else. That is certainly the view of BHA insiders, who say he is only speaking now because of his recent punishment.

In a way, Brock agrees with that last point, though of course he sees it differently from the BHA and insists he has done nothing wrong. This is what he says when asked about the timing of his complaint: "I've kept it all under wraps because I was still in the industry and I didn't want to cause a problem. Circumstances have changed. I think others should know."

What irks him is the BHA's handling of an incident in September 2017, when the regulator received an anonymous tipoff that Murdanova had been doped with bute and would have it in his system when he raced that night at Wolverhampton. The BHA said nothing to Brock, who rode, or to trainer Denis Quinn, but made sure that Murdanova was tested after finishing sixth of 11.

The same thing happened when Murdanova ran again the following month, with a different jockey. A caller said he would be doped, the BHA said nothing to connections, Murdanova finished third and was tested again. I'm not depending on Brock for these details - they are recorded in the verdict of a disciplinary panel.

To Brock, it was "disgraceful" of the BHA to keep information about the tipoff to themselves. Bute is a painkiller and there was no way to know how much had been given, assuming the tipoff was accurate (as it subsequently proved to be). If Murdanova had some leg injury that would normally cause him to feel pain and slow down, he might on this occasion have kept going until disaster struck.

Brock says: "They put mine and a lot of other people's lives at risk, knowing full well the horse was tampered with before he even left the stables.

"Obviously, the horse ran poorly. He was quite a lively, strong horse but he was completely the opposite that day. When you're riding, you don't think something like that has happened. You think maybe he's just having an off day. But, putting the puzzle together, you can understand why now.

"If I'd gone forward that day and made the running and he'd had a heart attack or something like that, and come down, it could have been me dead and jockeys behind me injured. If someone had said the horse had been tampered with, or told Denis, the horse wouldn't have run."

Danny Brock: banned from racing for 15 yearsCredit: Edward Whitaker

Instinctively, I feel that Brock must be onto something here. The doping of a horse raises substantial risks for him and his rider, and there are also risks for every other participant in the race. Can it be right for the sport's regulator to keep quiet if it receives information that is not obviously false, indicating a doping?

I asked the BHA about its handling of Murdanova and whether a similar case would be handled the same way now. The only official comment that came back was: "The BHA is satisfied that the policies and procedures that we have in place in this area adequately protect both horses and riders."

I understand the need to be cagey in public pronouncement, so as to avoid compromising integrity and investigatory work. But saying nothing has the happy consequence of shielding the BHA from scrutiny.

Has it at least learned something from Murdanova and discussed the subject with the sport's various representative bodies to hammer out a policy for how to deal with tipoff information? My information points the other way.

Despite the fact that there are previous cases which could be drawn upon, I believe the official approach is still to deal with such matters on a case by case basis, with the risk of individual officials coming under sudden pressure to make a difficult decision, perhaps without any knowledge of what was done the last time such a thing happened.

Well, what is the right thing to do? Could a workable policy be formulated that would deal effectively with all such cases? It would be rash to claim such a thing was straightforward but I feel the sport's senior figures ought at least to be trying because if you don't, the next thing that happens is you get a call about a runner in the Derby or the Grand National. Then what?

It crossed my mind that officials could give themselves the right, in such circumstances, to order that the horse be withdrawn. But that won't work as a routine response. Once that was known to be the policy, any runner could be knocked out of any race by someone simply picking up the phone to call in a tipoff.

So what about this: the BHA tests the horse on its arrival at the racecourse, making sure it can find out the truth or otherwise of the alleged doping, and then talks to trainer and jockey to ask if they are happy to race. What information the BHA is happy to share will depend on the circumstances but it would include at a minimum the fact that a doping tipoff had been received and perhaps an indication as to the perceived credibility of the claim.

The decision as to whether or not to race then becomes one for connections to make. The trainer will know how they feel about their own security arrangements. Some will have taken every precaution and believe the call must be bogus. Others may have a troubling awareness of vulnerability.

Doping is rare, or so we believe at any rate. Doping cases in which the regulator received an accurate tipoff before the race must be still more rare. We're not talking about something that comes up even as often as once a year.

But it's very important to handle it the right way when it does happen. I just don't like the idea of officials watching a race with the knowledge that the wellbeing of a certain runner may well have been compromised, a fact of which the horse's rider, trainer and owner are oblivious.

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The Front Runner is our latest email newsletter available exclusively to Members' Club Ultimate subscribers. Chris Cook, a four-time Racing Reporter of the Year award winner, provides his take on the day's biggest stories and tips for the upcoming racing every morning from Monday to Friday. Not a Members' Club Ultimate subscriber? Click here to join today and also receive our Ultimate Daily emails plus our full range of fantastic website and newspaper content