Mike Dillon: Ridiculous idea dreamt up by PC brigade, not horsemen

Here's the go.

Lunch On Sunday is a head in front in the Melbourne Cup with 100m to run.

He's under pressure.

Rider Harry Houdini goes to pull the whip and remembers he's already hit Lunch On Sunday with it five times since the 200m.

Harry keeps the whip tucked away and gets beaten a nose in the A$5.5 million richest staying race in the world.

Yeah, right.

Harry decides he'll avoid a fine and come back next year and try and win the Melbourne Cup.

Double yeah, right.

It is impossible not to agree with Victorian Jockeys' Association (VJA) director Ross Ingliss that Australia's new whip rules, just two weeks and two days old, are unworkable.

Australia is a punting nation. Probably the world's best.

The owner and trainer, and the supporters of the imaginary Lunch On Sunday know what they expect.

And that's to win and to win at all reasonable cost.

The new Australian whip rules do not distinguish between a Melbourne Cup and a maiden race around oil drums in the dust at Birdsville.

You'd just like to be amid the discussion between connections in the Flemington mounting yard when a jockey came back in and said they could have won the Melbourne Cup if they'd legally been able to encourage the horse just one more time inside the 200m. Ten years' hard labour would be a better option than what might result from that.

No one likes to see horses flogged.

This column has railed against excessive use of the whip on several occasions.

It's simply not necessary on some horses.

On a smaller percentage it absolutely is.

Remember Bob Vance, who finished third on New Zealand stayer Te Akau Nick in Vintage Crop's Melbourne Cup, a decade and a half ago?

By Vance's own admission, few horses have been hit as often down the Flemington straight, but that's always qualified with the offering that the horse wouldn't have run a place without it.

It is, after all, the Melbourne Cup.

And then you've got the effectiveness of the jockey in his or her ability to use the whip.

Some look like they're bashing and can't actually do a lot of damage.

Others look less effective and can hurt a horse when they wish.

Australia's new rules do not allow jockeys to lift the whip above shoulder height.

There is one senior jockey still riding who never lifted about the shoulder, but hit them harder than anyone else.

The problem with these sort of regulations is that they're customer-driven in the area of image.

That means it's not always driven by common sense.

Racing, particularly in Victoria, is so PC about image.

Look at the way Victoria racing bowed down to the liberal, bleeding-heart do-gooders who, only a handful of years ago, forced racing to lower the height of the jumps in the name of safety and actually, through ignorance, created a bigger problem which almost saw jumping races banned and, in fact, they could still be.

New Zealand's whip rules make much more sense.

Here in the home straight, a jockey can use the whip for six consecutive strides and ride hands and heels for a further six strides before reverting to whip use.

Inside the final 200m, a rider may use the whip continuously provided the horse is holding its position or improving.

Here, excessive use means simply "too much" and is not confused with "unduly punished".

Horses are not required to be marked for an excessive charge to be proven.