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| Staff Writer |
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Franconia has been disqualified from a listed race she won at Newbury last year, having tested positive for ketamine which, a disciplinary panel has accepted, probably derived from recreational use of the drug by her groom.
John Gosden, her trainer, was fined the unusually low sum of £500 (US$694) by the panel, which decided he had taken precautions to avoid such an eventuality but could conceivably have done more.
Presenting the BHA's case, Tomas Nolan described how investigators were initially baffled as to the cause, ketamine being a powerful anesthetic generally confined to veterinary clinics and not found in racing yards. Gosden said it was never used at his Clarehaven stables in Newmarket.
But, some weeks into the investigation, a staff member came forward to admit recreational ketamine use, which he said was confined to his weekends off. He was described by Gosden as a "vulnerable person" who had come into his employ as "a man in a bit of a muddle" and the panel directed that in the circumstances he should not be named.