Trainers caught up in the Formestane drug saga have broken their silence, saying they have been left branded as cheats, fined, confused and financially drained – without any explanation of how the positives occurred or how to stop it happening again.
Julius Sandhu, Amy Yargi and Smiley Chan were each fined $4000 – half of which was suspended provided they don’t reoffend in the next 12 months – by the Victorian Racing Tribunal last Monday.
Mark and Levi Kavanagh and Symon Wilde received a heftier $6000 fine for the same charge.
Speaking to Betsy, Sandhu expressed frustration and confusion following the conclusion of the long-running case, during which he spent tens of thousands of dollars to clear his name.
“I’m walking away from it now with absolutely no clarity moving forward,” Sandhu said.
“There is no understanding whatsoever about what I need to do or not do to ensure I don’t find myself in the same predicament again.”
Sandhu’s horse Alphaville had traces of Formestane and its metabolite 4-hydroxytestosterone in a post-race urine sample after his win at The Valley in February 2023.
Sandhu still has no idea how Alphaville returned a positive swab and admits he is unsure how he can avoid the situation happening again.
Claims from an RV vet during the VRT hearing in December that a possible cause of the positive was deliberate administration were sensationally withdrawn and there has been evidence both inside and outside the hearing that Formestane can be endogenous in horses.
Despite this, as well as a concession from the Tribunal Chair Peter Reardon that there is no evidence of wrongdoing by the trainers, the VRT chose to proceed with the fines.
Any sanction is designed to act as a ‘general deterrent’ to other trainers but Sandhu questioned what he and other trainers are meant to be deterred from doing in this case.
He also confirmed that Racing Victoria’s stewards and vets have provided no advice about how he can avoid a repeat of the situation.
“There is a sense of feeling very unsupported as a participant, a trainer and someone who is part of the broader racing family,” he said.
“As has been said many times during this case, the integrity of racing is paramount and I agree, I totally get that, but I would like to think that there is belief in the integrity of the people that are participating in the game as well.”
“As part of the agreement reached between the parties at the Tribunal, there was a stated common belief that the trainers evidence was taken to be truthful.”
“But then Racing Victoria asked for a $15,000 fine so for me, if you’re attempting to implement a fine, there must be an internal belief that we’ve done something wrong.”
“So they (VRT) fine me and tell me not to do it again.”
“Don’t do what again? I’m not sure what I’m not meant to do.”
“There is not one single trainer that would look at this case and think ‘I better not do that’ because we don’t even know what it is that we’ve meant to have done.”
“If I’d got a positive for Bute or Metacam or Ace or any medication that is used more commonly in a racing stable, I can look at my processes and make changes to ensure it doesn’t happen again and, in that case, I’d cop the fine and know that I needed to do better procedurally going forward.”
“But this (Formestane) is different – even they (authorities) don’t know what it is.”
“Unfortunately in this scenario, I can’t help but feel that we’ve been treated guilty until proven innocent.”
Yargi, who trains in partnership with her husband Ash Yargi, was charged by RV after her horse Yulara returned a positive post-urine swab after winning at Kilmore in April 2023.
Like Alphaville’s urine sample and every known Formestane positive in Australian racing, Yulara’s urine sample was first tested in Victoria’s RASL lab, which is part-owned by RV and located on site at their Epsom Road headquarters.
Yargi, who works for Racing Victoria’s media arm Racing.com, said the three-year ordeal has been draining, both financially and psychologically.
Like Sandhu, she is unsure what message the fine is meant to send to her, other trainers or the broader racing community, other than to suggest she’s done something wrong.
She said it is hard to ignore social media commentary suggesting that she has cheated.
“It’s been a really tough three years, mentally and financially, for everyone involved,” Yargi said.
“We took our horse to the races that day with nothing but fresh air in him.”
“We’ve maintained our innocence during the entire process and it is a little bit frustrating to get to the end of it all and be issued with a penalty.”
“The whole idea of a penalty is to deter someone from doing something again but we haven’t done anything in the first place and nobody can tell us how we can stop it from happening again.”
“It makes no sense to me.”
“It’s scary to think that in three years, nobody has been able to come up with an explanation about how this has occurred.”
“It would be comforting if the regulatory body could tell us how to stop this from happening again because we have no idea how it happened in the first place.”
“It’s just not fair.”
“The most hurtful thing is that our reputations have been tarnished for something that we haven’t done – you get called a cheat and there’s nothing worse in this sport.”
Sandhu’s business has also been impacted with the trainer detailing at least two instances in which owners that had expressed interest in sending him horses to train had decided to take their business elsewhere due to the public nature of the case.
Because 4-hydroxytestosterone is classed as an anabolic steroid, all horses with Formestane positives were disqualified from the race in which they returned a positive swab and stood down from racing for 12 months, despite VRT Chairman acknowledging the trace amounts of each substance in the samples would have had no performance enhancing effects.
Patrick Payne and Tom Dabernig have been charged with presenting horses to race with Formestane in their system, while several others have returned positives and are waiting for further direction from RV about whether they will also be charged.
Cases in Tasmania and South Australia, two states that also use the RASL lab to test samples, are currently underway.
Yargi called on the Australian Trainer’s Association to step in and work with authorities to find a solution that will ensure innocent trainers don’t continue to be punished.
“I think the ATA needs to go into bat for trainers on this,” she said.
“To my knowledge, there are at least another 16 Formestane positives currently pending and I feel really sorry for the next group of the trainers that will have to go through what we have gone through.”
When contacted by Betsy, RV confirmed that it has not issued an industry notice regarding the prohibited substances Formestane and its metabolite 4-hydroxytestoeterone nor has any advice been made public about how trainers can avoid a positive swab.
