RACING:JOCKEY CATHAL Landers has been suspended for three months and fined €500 by the Turf Club after testing positive for cannabis at Leopardstown races last Christmas.
Landers (22) from Oola in Co Limerick had one ride at the Co Dublin track on the second day of the Christmas festival, finishing unplaced on Gryllus, trained by his boss James Nash.
He rode a winner 24 hours later on board Star Of Aragon for Nash. Star Of Aragon had given Landers his first ever racecourse success at the 2011 Galway festival.
Evidence was heard yesterday from the Turf Club medical officer Adrian McGoldrick and Ken Hartnett, a volunteer project worker with the Aras Newbridge treatment centre.
Hartnett said he had been working with Landers since the positive result and he was making good progress.
James Nash described the jockey as a particularly good worker with a good attendance record.
Having considered all the evidence and noting that Landers had admitted the offence at an early stage and did not request that the “B” sample be analysed, the Turf Club’s referrals committee found he was in breach of Rule 277 and guilty of a doping offence.
In arriving at their decision the committee said that it had to balance the seriousness of the offence with the genuine efforts that Cathal Landers was making to address the issues which arose.
The Turf Club also confirmed yesterday it will reciprocate the British Horseracing Authority’s three-year ban on jockey Jason Behan which ends next year. Behan was suspended under “non-trier” rules following the running of Casela Park at Newcastle in 2010.
A Turf Club hearing into a BHA request to reciprocate their ban on Casela Park’s trainer Eamonn Tyrell was postponed yesterday until May 21st.
Trainer Eddie Harty was fined €700 by the referrals committee yesterday for using the Curragh training ground with a horse not returned in training.
Co Tipperary jockey/trainer Denis Hogan has appealed the decision of the Limerick stewards last Thursday to ban Norah Starr for 60 days under the “non-trier” rules.
Hogan rode the horse at Limerick and was banned from riding for 14 days, while being fined €1,000 as the trainer of the horse.
