Vindication for IHRB as Luke Comer hit with three-year training ban

If Irish racing is reeling from the fallout of the three-year training ban handed down to billionaire businessman Luke Comer after 12 of his horses tested positive for anabolic steroids, there appears to be a sense of vindication in at least one corner of the sport.

Almost two years after an out-of-competition raid on Comer’s Kilternan yard, Irish Horseracing Regulatory Board officials were expressing satisfaction on Thursday at a case prosecuted to the end. “We’re the regulator and we’re regulating,” said one, privately.

Having been under attack for much of the last decade, a new pep in the step of racing’s police body was perhaps understandable.

The IHRB has long been accused of not being on top of the doping threat. It is also awaiting the outcome of an independent inquiry into a “bombshell” financial issue that has its chief financial officer on voluntary leave. So there was satisfaction at this evidence of anti-doping mechanisms working.

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Alerted by a positive hair-sample taken from the Comer-trained He Knows No Fear after it finished fourth at Leopardstown in October 2021, the IHRB arrived unannounced at Comer’s premises three weeks later, to carry out other hair samples on a dozen of his horses.

All of them, including He Knows No Fear once more, tested positive for metandienone and/or methlylestosterone, which are prohibited substances at all times.

The IHRB’s equine anti-doping strategy has evolved in recent years to operate on a sophisticated risk and intelligence basis

A lengthy disciplinary process included a nine-day referral committee hearing chaired by Justice Brian McGovern in May. The delay in releasing details until Thursday reflected the gravity of the situation, as Comer vigorously denied wrongdoing by himself or his staff.

The high-profile businessman, who built up the Comer Group into a multibillion-euro property empire and told the referrals panel that he spends no more than three months a year in Ireland, argued that the drugs could have got into the horses from hay contaminated with pig slurry.

The panel found no evidence of deliberate doping, but with no explanation for how the substances got into the horses, as the licence holder Comer carried the can. He was ordered to pay 80 per cent of the IHRB’s legal costs – a sum over €750,000 – as well as picking up fines totalling 85,000,

For such a wealthy individual, the financial cost won’t sting anywhere near as much as the ignominy of being at the heart of the biggest drugs scandal in Irish racing history. The fallout casts a shadow too over an entire sector that has been under fire for much of the last decade in relation to doping.

Not finding any evidence of cheating inevitably results in suspicion, while embarrassment and reputational damage come with uncovering cases

Trainer Philip Fenton lost his licence for three years in 2014 after anabolic steroids were found in his yard.

The former Department of Agriculture veterinary inspector John Hughes, a brother of former trainer Pat Hughes, was “warned off” for five years after “commercial” quantities of the steroid Nitrotain were found at his home in 2012.

It’s only a couple of years since trainer Charles Byrnes had his licence suspended for six months after being found seriously negligent when his runner Viking Hoard was “nobbled” with a sedative at Tramore racecourse in 2018.

Another trainer, David Dunne, was suspended for four months after a winner tested positive for an anabolic steroid in 2019. That same year, the Denis Hogan-trained Turbine received the unwanted accolade of being the first horse in Ireland to test positive for an anabolic steroid, although that was after a veterinary mix-up.

Jim Bolger’s claims in 2020 that doping was Irish racing’s number one problem, and that he had no faith in the IHRB’s ability to catch cheats, prompted appearances in front of the Oireachtas Agriculture Committee which resulted in an independent review of the regulator’s anti-doping procedures.

If some were unpersuaded by the largely positive outcome of that review, the Comer case is at least some tangible evidence of drugs being uncovered and penalties handed out.

[ Billionaire horse trainer Luke Comer banned for doping offences ]

Racing is no different to other sports when facing up to the doping threat: not finding any evidence of cheating inevitably results in suspicion, while embarrassment and reputational damage come with uncovering cases.

There’s likely to be concern, too, about whether a three-year licence suspension is enough of a deterrent. British racing was rocked a decade ago when the Godolphin trainer Mohammed Al Zarooni was banned for eight years, after admitting he gave 15 horses anabolic steroids in 2010.

Earlier this year, Co Armagh trainer Ronan McNally received a record 12-year disqualification, the biggest penalty handed out by the Irish regulator in modern times, for a range of rule breaches that included the passing on of inside information and concealment of the ownership of various horses.

It came after a lengthy IHRB investigation into the improvement in form of some of McNally’s horses that were at the centre of high-profile gambles.

For such a wealthy individual, the financial cost won’t sting anywhere near as much as the ignominy of being at the heart of the biggest drugs scandal in Irish racing history

With his immense wealth behind him, it will be interesting to see if Comer, the former plasterer from Glenamaddy in Co. Galway, appeals against the IHRB’s penalties. He has seven days in which to lodge such an appeal. Efforts to contact the businessman were unsuccessful.

But on Thursday, the regulator was taking the good from a bad news day.

“The IHRB’s equine anti-doping strategy has evolved in recent years to operate on a sophisticated risk and intelligence basis backed by rigorous processes of investigation and follow-through in the event of an adverse analytical finding,” a statement said.

“IHRB anti-doping teams can take samples from any thoroughbred horse in any location at any time to maximise the likelihood of detecting prohibited substances if they are there, to deter those who might be tempted to cheat through doping, and to disrupt inappropriate activities.”

Who is Luke Comer, the billionaire businessman at the centre of racing’s biggest scandal?

Brothers Brian and Luke Comer come from Glenamaddy, Co Galway, and worked as plasterers in England before getting involved in substantial property developments there. They later invested heavily in property in Germany and, following the crash in the Irish property market in the late 2000s, bought up a substantial amount of property here at hugely reduced values.

In an interview with The Irish Times in 2015, Luke Comer spoke about the reduced values at which they bought Irish property in the wake of the property bust.

“It’s been fantastic value the way it worked out,” he said. “We bought properties valued at €2.5 billion to €3 billion for about €400 million. A lot of it is probably worth more than double that now, I suppose.”

The Comer brothers run a UK-based operation that has extensive residential and commercial property interests in the UK, continental Europe and Ireland.

Earlier this month, the group said it would be “extremely interested” in buying 261 acres of land beside Dublin Airport that are owned by brothers Ulick and Des McEvaddy and three other shareholders.

In August, plans to complete a 14-storey derelict building, the Sentinel tower in Sandyford, Dublin, were lodged with Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council by a company owned by the Comers, who plan to convert what was to be an office building into an apartment block. – Colm Keena