17/08/2016

(17 August 2016)

During the Palio held in Siena on August 16th, there was yet another accident involving a horse at the second lap: this time the victim was Reynard King. The horse was in fourth position when he suddenly disappeared from the TV shots, without this being noticed by commentators live. Analyzing the VIDEO you can see the horse still standing along the track, suffering on three legs, while the race ends (minute 00,20):

Later the Municipality said that the horse sustained "a swelling in the discal part of the front right leg". In reality, from information that we obtained, Reynard King suffered a compound fracture of the second phalanx. He is not in danger of life and he will probably recover, but again we have to see the Municipality’s attempt to minimize the accident and to shift the focus elsewhere: a sign, perhaps, that these repeated accidents create some embarrassment to a public authority that strives to bring up this tradition as respectful of the horses.

No embarrassment, instead, for organizers and local people in celebrating the victory of Jonathan Bartoletti: the jockey who in 2013, at the start of the Palio of Asti, repeatedly whipped the horse Mamuthones causing his reaction and the subsequent ruinous and fatal fall (here the video of the accident).




(picture from Rainews24: www.rainews.it)