It’s Melbourne Cup day today making Melbourne horse racing, marquee, hat, fascinator and fashion city.
There is usually one star of the carnival and this year that appears to be Michelle Payne, pictured. In the very male dominated sport that is jockeying, Michelle has been chosen to ride some high profile and very favoured horses in some of the country’s richest horse races. Michelle’s rise to fame is made more special by the fact that she has endured her fair share of life’s challenges which you can read about here.
All the feel good stories about Michelle however, have not been able to calm some very real fears I have for her. They have arisen from a piece on Michelle published in the Herald Sun that went into detail about the extreme lengths she was going to be a certain weight for the race she was riding in. Michelle “is prepared to take her weight battle to the wire, even if she has to sweat that last kilogram off at the racetrack sauna three hours before the race” and “Payne has barely eaten, but has walked, run, swum and ridden herself ragged.”
The newspaper also published Michelle’s diary (not available online) which consisted of 1 1/4 cups of muesli, 1 boiled egg, 1 piece of fish, 2 small tins of tuna, 1 serve of brown rice, 2 serves of vegetables and 1 caffeine drink. Some people may think for an elite athlete in training, this sort of food consumption would be acceptable in a day. Problem is, leading up to a race day, this is what Michelle eats in 1 week. Read over the food again and take it in. 1 weeks worth. On two of the days, Michelle ate nothing but 1/4 of a cup of dry muesli. On another she ate nothing. All while doing hours and hours of running, swimming, interval training and horse racing.
How is the racing fraternity permitting this to happen? Simple. The lighter the jockey, the faster a horse is able to run, win and make money. As Matthew Tiemeyer states: “Because lighter jockeys get more rides, their pay is tied directly to their weight. So jockeys will do most anything — stimulant drugs, exercise in plastic suits, long periods in saunas, and the old standby, purging (called “flipping” among jockeys). Many race tracks actually have “heaving bowls” installed in bathroom stalls to accommodate the 30% of jockeys who purge to make or maintain weight. The health consequences are staggering and life-threatening. Jockeys who stay dehydrated in order to avoid water weight can push their liver and kidneys to failure. It also can cause heart arrhythmias that can be fatal.”
Sports and activities such as ballet and gymnastics have been highly criticised for the role that body shape, size and weight in those disciplines can and does contribute to the development of eating disorders. In many instances this is certainly warranted, but the thing that strikes me as more outrageous in the case of jockeys is that eating disorder behaviours are openly encouraged. Flipping bowls to accommodate for purging? That’s certainly not keeping things secret. The racing fraternity is encouraging jockeys to engage in behaviours that promote or sustain the development of an eating disorder and is risking their lives in doing so. How ironic that the industry is then upheld as a beacon of all that is fine, glamorous and elite when this sort of grubby and exploitative practice goes on. The racing industry needs to be called into serious question as to why they are encouraging their athletes to develop mental and physical illnesses. I don’t care about the argument that this is about the comfort of the horses and for them not to carry someone too ‘heavy.’ If that were the case then only those people who were naturally petite or light and did not have to go to extremes to dramatically alter their body weight and shape, would participate in the sport. Pushing jockey’s like Michelle Payne into near starvation to be deemed acceptable to race is negligent.
If the industry can’t manage to do that – then at least increase the weights jockey’s are required to be for varying divisions. It’s very, very clear that where they are right now is simply not realistic and attainable for even the lightest of adults.
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It's terrible how accepted that is in things like racing, and people like boxers doing the same. Rowing was like that in Uni too – girls starving the week before teh uni games to make sure they were in the 57kg division
That's TERRIBLE!