For the first time in three weeks horses will race at Santa Anita Park in California on Friday, beneath the spectacular backdrop of the San Gabriel mountains. The course has been closed since 5 March to allow officials to inspect and renovate the dirt track following the death of 22 horses when either training or racing in the first nine weeks of the 2019 season. The hope is that one of the racing world’s most cherished courses can begin to move on from a traumatic start to the year.

But while the unforgettable setting endures, the racing itself will look quite different if The Stronach Group, which owns Santa Anita, gets its way. In what it described as “an open letter about the future of thoroughbred racing in California”, published on 14 March, TSG made two radical proposals for the resumption of racing at Santa Anita and its other track in the state, Golden Gate Fields near San Francisco.

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The first, an immediate ban on the use of all race-day medication including the anti-bleeding drug Lasix, has since been watered down and will start with the two-year-old crop in 2020. The second, though, seems likely to apply from Friday: a ban on the use of the whip by jockeys for anything but “corrective safety measures”.

If so, Santa Anita will be the first track in a major racing nation to ban the whip for encouragement at any stage of a race. It will also set a precedent that racing regulators around the world will struggle to ignore. If Santa Anita can get by without the whip in the closing stages of a race, why can’t everyone?

The British Horseracing Authority will be watching with interest. “We talk regularly to our colleagues in other countries where racing is held,” a spokesperson said this week. “Events have moved quite quickly in recent weeks in California and we look forward to catching up at the next opportunity to hear more of their plans.”

Quick guide Racing tips for Monday 25 March Show Hide Wincanton: 2.15 Belmont Jewel 2.45 Secret Investor 3.15 Deauville Dancer 3.45 Findusatgorcombe 4.15 Kimberley Point (nap) 4.45 Storm Arising Lingfield: 2.30 Soaring Spirits 3.00 First Link 3.30 Atomic Jack 4.00 Gumball 4.30 Monadante 5.00 Don’t Do It Wolverhampton: 5.15 Nice To Sea 5.45 Mercury (nb) 6.15 Top Breeze 6.45 Griggy 7.15 Peachey Carnehan 7.45 Admiral Rooke

There is a belief among some followers of British racing that a similar move here is only a matter of time. They may well see Santa Anita’s attempt to ban the whip as the first domino to topple, with a whip-free conclusion to the Grand National and the Derby inevitably somewhere down the line.

But first the whip ban will need to stick at Santa Anita and to be seen as a success in both competitive and commercial terms. Will the form stand up? Will the jockeys adapt? And will punters still watch and bet on whipless races to the same extent at all or any level?

For the moment this abrupt and very radical change of policy will be limited to Santa Anita and Golden Gate Fields and is unlikely to extend even to other TSG-owned tracks elsewhere, such as Pimlico in Maryland, which stages the second leg of America’s Triple Crown, the Preakness Stakes. As an internal “house rule”, it is also unlikely to apply to the Breeders’ Cup, which returns to Santa Anita this November for a record 10th time and to all intents hires the track as a venue for its own, separate event.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest The ban on use of the whip at Santa Anita Park could set a precedent that racing regulators around the world will struggle to ignore. Photograph: Tom Jenkins/The Guardian

But precedents, once set, can be very difficult to ignore. If the previous seven months of racing at the track have indeed been run without use of the whip for encouragement, including trials for the major Breeders’ Cup events, it will jar to see the whips waving on the big day itself.

And it is anyone’s guess how the form might work out when horses trained and conditioned under one set of rules come up against runners from a different regime. The betting “handle” on the Breeders’ Cup – a record $136m at Churchill Downs in Kentucky last year – underpins its success and these are the sort of uncertainties which can make punters wary about parting with their cash.

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Santa Anita’s ban on Lasix, somewhat delayed though it will ultimately be, is expected to reduce field sizes – and therefore betting handle – at the course next year in any case. If punters also respond negatively to a ban on the whip for encouragement, the track’s executives will have dug themselves into a hole with no obvious means of escape.

For those, like me, who feel the whip is a complex issue with no simple solution, Santa Anita’s move looks like part of a slightly panicked response to a welfare crisis.

And yet, the modern, air-cushioned whip does not really belong in the welfare debate. The BHA’s concerns are more to do with how it looks to outsiders and potential new racegoers than any belief that it actually inflicts pain. It is simply too light to do that.

It is also a big leap to suggest whipping played a part in any of the 22 fatalities at the track this year but the ban still seems set to be in place from Friday. While the most earnest hope is for a safe, incident-free resumption of racing at one of the sport’s most sumptuous venues, there is also a nagging worry that the road to hell is paved with good intentions.