A TRAINER has been fined and his winning horse disqualified and stripped of victory – after testing positive for an anti-depressant.
Mare Lady Wingalong failed a drugs test after it emerged a yard work had weed in the horse’s stable.
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Trainer David Evans – who has been allowed to keep his training licence after the ‘exceptional’ case – said he was ‘shocked’ at the finding.
Lady Wingalong was an 18-1 winner of a Class 6 7f handicap at Lingfield last April.
Ridden by David Probert, she kept on well inside the final furlong to record her first ever victory by a length from 9-2 favourite Ballyboymoonshiner.
But the mare would go onto test positive for Venlafaxine – an anti-depressant that according to the NHS ‘increases the levels of mood-enhancing chemicals called serotonin and noradrenaline in the brain’.
A disciplinary panel heard that ultimately a yard worker was responsible for the finding.
Ravi Mehta, a barrister representing Evans, said: “The contamination appears to have arisen from the strange confluence of three factors.
“First, the use by Mr Evans’s former employee of medication which she wasn’t using at the start of her employment.
“She later developed depression and was prescribed Venlafaxine.
“Second, she didn’t inform her employer of that development or any change in her position.
“And third, she had a bladder condition, which caused her to urinate urgently, even though there were toilet facilities within the vicinity of the stables.”
The anti-depressant would have had no impact on the horse’s performance, Mehta said.
But the BHA argued Evans – who has enjoyed multiple Group level successes with top sprinter Rohaan – could have done more to prevent the bizarre breach and fined him £1,000.
The trainer was praised for his full co-operation throughout the investigation.
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