Anna Jordso reckons she didn't need boyfriend Josh Cartwright's help to win. PHOTO/GETTY IMAGES
FUNDAMENTAL to stamping supremacy in any form of sport is the mastery of one's thoughts.
That is, have your mental faculties in humming order and people start extolling the virtues of athletes who have matured and their skills evolved to a level where they seem to be in control of proceedings almost instinctively.
But human nature is a strange beast. If individuals are in control of their thoughts that doesn't necessarily mean their emotions are on a leash.
In fact, some people become slaves to their emotions to the extent their inherent cognitive skills are rendered useless.
But I believe there's little harm in switching to overdrive every so often in matters pertaining to the heart.
For argument's sake, when people are in love they tend to become irrational.
That takes me to the world of thoroughbred racing, a code I found in my journalism career to be teeming with characters although it has been on a decline lately because sometimes the pressure of crossing the line often kills the plot.
Last Saturday jockey Josh Cartwright steered his horse into the path of two rivals to allegedly impede their progress in the home straight, at the 200m mark, to enable his Norwegian-born girlfriend, Anna Jordsjo, to maintain her lead all the way on $4 favourite Murti at the Morphettville track in South Australia.
Lover boy Cartwright, 22, pleaded guilty to reckless riding and has been stood down from riding, including track work, pending further investigation.
I looked up the couple's profiles on Racing.Com and made some interesting references.
Jordsjo, a 21-year-old apprentice, started the year with a winner on New Year's Day on a mount called Barge and Charge.
She rode Murti to victory after 44 races. Leading up to that win, she had more back-of-the-field results, including several dead lasts, than top-three placings.
Ironically, Cartwright rode Murti as a $7 favourite on December 31 to fourth place over 1200m, 50m shy of Jordsjo's winning distance.
What struck me was the Victorian's act of chivalry. I mean the girlfriend's not going too well so what is a bloke to do, for goodness sake?
Cartwright, who was riding $51 outsider Senior Council, is reportedly holding dual licences and was on track to have his first runner as a trainer in a few weeks.
One can only assume he thought (okay, brain fade if you insist) why not do something for a girlfriend who has no qualms about mucking out the stable, if TV footage is anything to go by.
I mean it's all very good of her to crow about how she can win her own race but her results don't stack up.
Winning after 40-odd races is hardly a decent report card in Adelaide, let alone the rite of passage to the cutthroat tracks of Victoria, as Cartwright has found out in trying to claim the apprentice's title in South Australia to boost his resume.
Pursuing perfection, my friends, can be a trifle boring in sport.
To stray from the predictable script is, without doubt, a celebration of human nature.
But wait, there's more to this beautiful saga, albeit veering like an errant Cupid's arrow.
The Herald Sun reports Cartwright has yet to apologise to the favoured pair of Matthew Poon, on Go The Journey, and Jason Holder in the saddle of House Of Wax.
Murti (Cartwright), House of Wax (Shane Cahill) and Go The Journey (Paul Gatt) were involved in an incident at their previous start, at Morphettville on December 31.
On that day stewards concluded House Of Wax clipped Murti's heels at the 900m mark and, in retaliation, Murti veered off his path to break House Of Wax's stride but, somehow, Cartwright received a "severe reprimand".
Murti ran fourth, House Of Wax fifth and Go The Journey sixth.
Intriguingly the three geldings seem to be the protagonists, at least in the media report, but Cartwright was admonished formally.
No wonder the case has divided the Aussie thoroughbred industry.
Let it be known that Cartwright is no angel. In 2015 he was fined $500 for attempting to grab a rival rider's whip at the height of a race. But then you'd expect that from a breed of short-tempered, food-deprived species who take drastic measures to make the weight on race days.
Retired Aussie champion jockey Johnny Letts told TV One: "I've never seen anything like it."
That's why ending Cartwright's career would be a tragedy for a code in desperate need of characters.
I say allow for some leeway to obstruct, akin to blockers in American football, with safety in mind, to kill the banality of merry-go-round endings.
It can't be any more illogical then Black Caps coach Mike Hesson seeing nothing wrong with bouncers in cricket that sconed Neil Wagner senseless last week and killed Australian batsman Phillip Hughes in 2014.
Not that logic will ever change emotion or perception.