Silver Story’s trainer scores suspension

Jun Paman, the country’s leading horse trainer, yesterday assailed the Philracom’s decision suspending him and Triple Crown champion Silver Story in the aftermath of the horse’s dismal run in the recent Mitra Cup Championships.

Paman, who trained and developed Silver Story to become one of the country’s 12 Triple Crown champions, said the three-month suspension slapped on him and on the champion horse was "very stiff and grossly one-sided."

"The suspension will not only hurt Silver Story and his connections, but the racing public as well since this would deny the horse to compete in the coming big races like the Breeders’ Cup, the Presidential Gold Cup and the Philracom Classic," said Paman. "In fact, we have prepared Silver Story for these races."

Acting on the sworn declaration of Silver Story jockey Jonathan Hernandez, who claimed the horse to be hurting, the Philracom suspended Silver Story and Paman for the latter’s failure to report to the board of stewards a defect on the horse.

But Paman maintained that Silver Story was in tip-top form when he ran that race and his lackluster run was due to the fact that his racing plate was accidentally removed at the start of the race.

"It was clear in the video that the plate was accidentally removed, but this was not even considered during the investigation," Paman said.

Paman even presented two farriers (horse shoe blacksmith) – Bobby Reyes and Ronald Tanagon – one of whom testified that nothing was really wrong with the horse.

He added that Hernandez’s statement should not be taken into consideration in the first place since "the veterinarians at the races had already given the horse the go-signal to run."