Burton’s Festival hopes in balance
Thursday 18th February 2010, 1:18PM GMT.
Shropshire’s Richard Burton, three-times National Point-to-Point champion jockey, could miss the Cheltenham Festival, writes JAMES GARRISON.
The leading amateur is assessing his options after being slapped with a 12-day ban after riding at Leicester yesterday.
Burton was beaten by 35 lengths aboard Oscar D’Angron and, following a lengthy enquiry, the stewards ruled he had not made “reasonable and permissible measures to reach his best possible finishing position”.
Burton was today reluctant to comment on the incident or over the prospects of an appeal, and was in talks with the British Horseracing Authority to clarify the exact dates of the suspension.
The situation is clouded as the ban can only fall on days when amateur riders’ races are scheduled. And that raises the prospect he could miss out on at least part of next month’s Cheltenham Festival, the showpiece event of the National Hunt calender.
Burton had a memorable moment at last year’s Festival when he teamed up with Cappa Bleu, trained by Hadnall’s Sheila Crow, to win the Foxhunter Chase.
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