Shane Foley has said his Royal Bahrain Irish Champion Stakes winning ride on Hotazhell at Leopardstown on Saturday was not as controversial as some critics have suggested.

The jockey’s performance on the Jessica Harrington-trained 50-1 shot was described as “brutal riding” by trainer Donnacha O’Brien, whose horse A Boy Named Susie was one of three horses checked when Hotazhell launched his challenge in the straight. A Boy Named Susie finished fifth.

“I thought it was brutal riding from ‘Dusty’ [Foley] to be honest. If a claimer did that, you’d give them a bollocking,” said the former dual-champion jockey in an unusually blunt public verdict on a rider’s performance.

Foley received an 11-day suspension for careless riding, with the stewards taking into consideration that it was his third offence for careless riding in the last six months as well as the “prolonged and continuous nature of the offence”.

The 38-year-old is a triple-Classic winning rider who has been Harrington’s No 1 since 2019 and one of the fixtures of the Irish jockeys’ room.

On Monday he tried to downplay the incident and pointed to the suspension as being the result of the Irish Horseracing Regulatory Board (IHRB) totting-up process for repeat offences.

“I don’t want to get into it too much. Everyone’s entitled to their opinion. In a way it was very good ride, [but] I could have corrected him. It was a little bit careless on my behalf. but I don’t think it was as bad as they’re making out,” said Foley, who ruled out any appeal.

“It’s just my third offence. It’s a totting-up period. I think people don’t realise that. If it was my first offence I’d have got only four days. But because it was my third offence it was an automatic eight days or plus, which probably makes if look and sound worse than it is.”

Foley’s ban will now rule him out of some big dates including the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe programme at Longchamp, Paris, next month. He and Harrington combined to land the Prix de l’Opera on Arc day a year ago.

The Irish rider is also employed by Ace Stud, the racing arm of the Zhang family, who owned his 2022 Irish Oaks winner Magical Lagoon. They recently bought into the unbeaten two-year-old Push The Boat Out, who is being aimed at the Middle Park Stakes at Newmarket this month. Foley is ruled out of that, too.

It isn’t the first Irish Champions Festival in which a major Group One victory for Foley at Leopardstown has come under fire. Foley landed the Matron Stakes for Harrington in 2021 aboard No Speak Alexander, after which he got a five-day suspension for careless riding.

Aidan O’Brien subsequently said Foley should have got a month for what the champion trainer considered “dangerous riding”.

He said at the time: “It shouldn’t have happened. There aren’t many countries in the world where you could get away with that and not get a month’s ban because to me that is dangerous riding. If the jockeys are allowed to do those things and are not given severe penalties, it will keep happening.”

Foley’s offence on Hotazhell was also classified as careless, although an IHRB spokesman pointed out the 11-day suspension was on the “high end of careless”.

Entry-level careless riding offences are punished with a minimum of two days. A second breach gets at least four days, and it is a basic eight days for a third offence. The level up from careless is improper riding, with dangerous at the top. The IHRB declined to comment further on the weekend case.

Foley was judged to have ridden improperly at Naas in June and he was suspended for nine days. However, on appeal the jockey had the penalty reduced to six days as the appeals panel said he was guilty of the lesser breach of careless riding.

The jockey is in action at Punchestown’s flat fixture on Tuesday with a handful of rides including Motta Alta, who has a second start for Harrington in a mile handicap.

Joseph O’Brien has six runners at the Kildare track including Dancinginthecity for owner Seán Mulryan in a mile juvenile maiden. The opening fillies’ maiden should see the Ballydoyle hope Exceptionally, a half-sister to City Of Troy, hard to beat off a rating of 96.

Having saddled a 1-2 in Saturday’s Doncaster St Leger, Joseph O’Brien managed the same Group One feat in the following day’s National Stakes at the Curragh where Folsom Blues was a spectacular six-length winner from Monogram.

The trainer is examining the possibility of sending the winner to Newmarket next for the Dewhurst, potentially en route to a tilt at the Breeders’ Cup in Keeneland, Kentucky. No call has been made yet as to where Monogram might be targeted next for his Juddmonte ownership.