Godolphin's number one rider and leading jockey in the UK William Buick has been banned for up to six weeks after pleading guilty to a charge of reckless riding on Sunday.
In Hong Kong, where Buick is currently riding during the British off season, when on board Pakistan Star in the Group 1 Hong Kong Vase, he managed to angle his mount towards the race favourite Waldgeist trained by Andre Fabre who then shifted in front of English raider Red Verdon and saw both there chances go out the window due to the impeding from Pakistan Star.
The 30 year old Norwegian jockey has been suspended for six weeks and fined HK$20,000 which is the equivalent of £2,000 sterling.
However Buick has decided to appeal against the severity of the ban as he believes it is far to harsh. The rider did plead guilty to the charge after the race on Sunday but since having time to reflect he must not be happy with the length of time he will be on the sidelines for.
(Credit Racing Post) Hong Kong Jockey Club stewards sent out a report which said: "In assessing the penalty, the stewards took into consideration Buick's guilty plea but also his actions had seriously compromised the safety and welfare of those horses and riders to his outside and had significantly impacted upon the chances of both Waldgeist and Red Verdon in this race."
This is now the second time in two years that William Buick has been involved in a charge for reckless riding. The first came in 2016 when again he was involved in hampering Pierre-Charles Boudot on board a Andre Fabre horse.
The Godolphin number one jockey was adjudged to have caused Armande and Boudot to knuckle in the running of the Group 1 prix Diane at Chantilly in June 2016, which caused the french jockey to unseat from the horse with just 250 metres left of the race.
The stewards in France banned Buick for 15 days for reckless riding but on top of that gave the European rider an extra 15 days for behaving offensively towards the officials, obviously not happy with the sanction he was given in the first place.
William Buick has had a superb 2018 as he has gone on to ride nine Group 1 in seven different countries which is somewhat unheard of nowadays. His greatest win of the season and arguably his career as a jockey came at Epsom in the Derby when taking the prestigious race on board Masar for Godolphin.
The Norwegian's ban if not successful with his appeal will start on December 17, running through to January 28.
(Credit Sunday Silence)