‘They Need to Rip That Pole Out’: Equestrian World Unites After a Faulty Marker Makes Jockey Commit an ‘Almost Fatal’ Mistake

Equestrian sports render a tricky arena to its pursuers, as its scoring is rather a tough nut to crack and has a wide space for mistakes. But, some mistakes if happened will have unimaginable repercussions. Tom Buckley narrowly avoided such a mistake. He was participating in a handicap hurdle class 5 horse race at Worcester when the incident happened.

The 22-year-old jockey was riding Ranco, a 3-1 favorite to win the race. Everything for the jockey went according to plan. They took the lead after crossing the last hurdle. As they were running towards the finish line, Buckley did a funny but unexpected act that could cost him the race. The clip of this got viral over the internet and grabbed many comments from equestrian fans.

Tom Buckley realizes in time at the equestrian race

A clip was shared on Twitter on At the Races page of the Worcester race. In the caption, it said “Crikey! A lucky escape for Tom Buckley as he mistakes the half-furlong pole for the winning post…!”

In the clip, it can be seen that as Tom Buckley approached the half-furlong pole, he stood up on the horse thinking he won the race. He mistook the half-furlong post as the winning post. Soon he realized that the race was not yet over and 100 meters left in the race. He immediately sat on the saddle and started whipping the horse. Thankfully, Ranco didn’t stop, and he continued his run till the finish line. Buckley won the race eventually and relieved himself emotionally by bowing his head in the end. 

This is not the first time such a mistake happened at this race course. A few months back, another jockey by the name of Joe Anderson has done the same mistake. The equestrian world unites in support of the young jockey after this episode and gave their thoughts in the comments.

Fans unite for Tom Buckley

The fans and the equestrian world came out in support of the 22-year-old jockey and shared their displeasure on the half-furlong pole. One fan said

Suggesting that since it happened earlier too, they should pull off the pole. Another fan 

 Suggested that the pole should be made shorter to distinguish itself from the final pole. Another online surfer said

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Citing that the pole should be marked differently from the final pole. Another horse race enthusiast wrote.

Praising him for realizing quickly his mistake, another fan wrote 

Praising his honesty and effort after realizing that race was not over yet.

Mistakes do happen, but for Tom, his honesty and timely realization gave him the win.

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