YOU’d have to consider it a sad situation when you have fulfilled your wildest dreams in your field of competition, but after achieving the success, there are people ready to diminish it or cause upset.

It was a week when we had to endure too many accusations – hurtful, damaging, some blatantly proved wrong but only after they had ruined a career.

And we have a few more, as yet lacking in specifics, but which have created a rather toxic environment around a jockey and some unpleasant exchanges on social media as people take different sides.

Since her King George success on Frodon, Bryony Frost hinted in a few interviews that she was unhappy with some issues in the weighroom concerning her and her fellow riders.

It later transpired that there is an on-going BHA investigation after she had made a complaint over alleged comments following a race last year.

Frost has been such a familiar sight on TV, so much that you forget she first came into the limelight when winning the Cheltenham Foxhunters on Pasha Du Polder in 2017 – just less than four years ago.

Winning the Grade 1 Kauto Star Novices’ Chase on Black Corton and her Ryanair Chase success on Frodon at the Festival were the highlights before the King George and her ebullient personality has done nothing but good for racing, in attracting more media attention.

She’s been lucky to be attached to such a big stable but there’s never any doubt that she’s earned her place there and she has articulated that on many occasions.

The racing media are often criticised for giving her so much attention but she is ‘box office’ in a sport where few jockeys are recognisable and her personality and ebullient post-race interviews are genuine and entertaining in the heat of the moment.

Frost is acknowledged to be a good rider and gets a good tune of many horses. There are two elements that stand out in making a good jockey: tactical awareness and strength in a finish. Hollie Doyle and Rachael Blackmore tick all the boxes but both will acknowledge that it was through experience, through riding regularly, that helped them improve to the level they are now at.

They have inspired many more women to give it a go but racing has been very slow to accept female riders in its top ranks.

This week’s Horse & Hound has a cover photo of Sheila Webster, who won Badminton Horse Trials, a supreme test of the skill of horse and rider, three times in the late 1950s. Males and females have competed alongside with no animosity in most equestrian sports for decades.

Yet it has been very slow in racing. An excellent analysis on the male/female ratio or riders in recent year on the flat can be found on the geegeez.co.uk website.

It gives an idea on where we are and there’s not likely to be any greater participation over jumps. It finds that on the flat in British racing (turf and all-weather) from January 1st 2016 to December 31st 2020, a period of five years, accounting for all riders in flat races, broken down by gender, male jockeys had 260,005 mounts compared with female jockeys’ 25,887. So yes, in that sense, as one of the few sports where men and women compete on equal terms, it’s a man’s game.

Man’s sport

On Saturday, ITV Racing and Adam Wedge were taken to task for the use of the phrase “it’s a man’s sport” used by the jockey in his post Welsh National interview, in the context that he was back in the saddle after two heavy falls. ITV also get criticised for building up the Bryony angle too much.

This was an off the cuff remark and Wedge later apologised but it surely wasn’t needed here – if anyone looking for insult took it to mean it was a sport for men only and not in reference to tough people who take a few hits and carry on, no more than we’ve seen Rachael Blackmore regularly do. God forbid, we find names like Bravemansgame and Gentlemansgame sexist!

Yet, you cannot argue that females are well outnumbered throughout the sport and acceptance in some areas has been slow.

Comments were also dug up from Ginger McCain, saying he didn’t like female jockeys but they were written 15 or more years ago and based on his life experiences. All are irrelevant now because the face of women’s sport has been transformed over the last 10 years.

The days of having a woman as a soccer pundit on Match of the Day could barely be imagined just five years ago, yet alone that she would be both knowledgeable and popular. Yet Alex Scott has now moved to regular slots in general prime time TV.

It was a bit unfortunate that Frost chose to make her feelings public but could then say little more on the details. It created speculation and into any such void various opinions and exaggerations are thrown. Bullying, jealousy? Would a jockey who has been up and down the country for years, rarely on Grade 1 rides or getting much media attention, be jealous of the attention?

Nothing was known of any issues arising from a race last September until now. Did the issue resurface after the King George where Frodon jumped out to his left and gave Santini a bit of grief?

Having looked at the Southwell race being referred to, it’s hard to see how Frost could be held any more responsible for a horse falling behind her than Paul Townend was for the waywardness of Asterion Forlonge in the Supreme last year (resulting in two fallers). Note also Nico de Boinville on Santini taking Monalee’s ground coming down the hill in the Gold Cup (received a ban).

Yes, we may say, toughen up, take it on the chin, but that can be difficult if you think you did nothing wrong and are outnumbered in the situation.

You would hope that a few things are now acknowledged everywhere.

That females can ride as well as males.

That Bryony Frost is a good rider and good for racing when it needs all the media coverage it can get.

But males are still the dominant gender in racing and, while equality may mean you take strong comment ‘on the chin’, the days of keeping issues that affect mental health solely in the ‘locker room’ should be long gone.