Posted on 05/20/2006 11:13:23 AM PDT by HairOfTheDog
Oh, and BTW, saying "let it be about the horse" is just your version of laying on the guilt. Sorry, won't wash. These threads are about far more than just the horse. They are about peoples' reactions to what happened to him. One of your reactions was and is to take it upon yourself to push a sweeping defense of the horse industry. You've made sure that the only way I, and others whose opinions vary even a bit from your defensive reaction, can participate further on these threads is to do so on your terms.
Now, YOU can give it a rest if you choose not to reply. If you choose to reply, you can hardly insist that I cannot do so in return.
The use of hardware that looks so common is remarkable. I've got a friend with a lot of hardware in her too, after a car accident. I don't think she has trouble with it either.
I remember a foal at the appy barn I grew up hanging out at, who was born with a front leg that was just ~bent~ wrong. Had been in an unfortunate position in the womb. They installed some hardware in the foal, that straightened it slowly by putting tension on it, and it had to also allow for growth, so they 'lengthened' it by turning some screws a few notches per a schedule. Medicine meets Auto Shop :~D
>I remember a foal at the appy barn I grew up hanging out at, who was born with a front leg that was just ~bent~ wrong.<
Hail to All was born with a hind leg turned wrongly below the hock. Since he could not stand, he could have been put down without owing the stud fee for Hail to Reason.
Instead, they applied a sweatscraper to the leg.
That length of bone never looked quite right, but not only did the horse get to the races, he won the Belmont.
A decidedly low tech approach, but I can see it working :~D
>One of your reactions was and is to take it upon yourself to push a sweeping defense of the horse industry. <
I think it's perfectly fair to offer concrete defense where it exists, and to correct misconceptions and errors.
That said, anyone who knows much of anything about racing or breeding knows quite well where the problems are. You don't want to sit through my rant about allowing horses to race on Lasix and Butazolidin, and the long-term effects of resulting performance distortions on any running breed. Or my lamentations about the shrinkage of American Grade 1 stakes; does anyone else here remember when the Jockey Club Gold Cup was a 2 mile race, and a mare named Shuvee won it twice? Or about the silliness of keeping rider weights at levels that made sense 150 years ago when minors could ride, but that now require adults to do some risky things to themselves to make weight.
Thanks. I happen to think it's not only fair, it's important to stand up for horse sport, lest we see legitimate and valuable horse sports come under attack by bad media spin and PETA nuts who would ban all forms of horse competition if they could.
I do...and then some. My memories go all the way back to Carry Back, Kelso and a horse named Bally Ache who won the 1960 Preakness, then died shortly afterward of a twisted intestine. I was very, very young then, barely more than a toddler, but I remember. Bally was the first horse I fell in love with, probably because of the name.
Wolstar, I went back through all the threads checking your posting to see where this discussion starting to become acrimonious. Your are right in that your first post is about Secretariat and then the horror about the horse and then your correct analysis of the injury.
It wasn't until you let your anger at the sport of horse racing and stating that no one tries to improve the safety is where we started to disagree. You thought that the horse should have been scratched since he went through the gate in the false start. Most of us disagreed and though the people on the scene is best able to make that decision. You are right that a pressure of a Triple Crown race would argue to continue unless something definite was seen or felt.
YOu mentioned that you could not take the heartbreak of continue to follow the sport since you had seen so many of the harsh endings of these horses careers.
I have seen many horsepeople that are very softhearted but can not accept the cold economic facts of maintaining unsound and non productive horses.
Most horseowners can accept the fact in their personal hobby but not in the aggregate which happens in the business of horse racing. They start to believe the sport is cruel and would like to ban it and do not support the sport.
I live in Maryland and we had quarantine at the tracks this winter due to neurolgical form of rhino. There were a lot of horse owners who own only pleasure horses that said they do not need horse racing to continue in this state. In that these people are shortsighted.
There was talk that maybe Magna entertainment who owns Laurel and Pimilco would move the Preakness to another state. Politician who could care less about the state of racing in Maryland were shocked and thought the state owned the race.
We have lost 4 TB's racetracks in the years that I have grown up in MD. Started to have a resurgence when de Francis first bought a harness track and was so sucessful he went on to buy the rest of the Maryland'd tracks. But then he dies and he son does not have the same gift.
Racetracks have to compete for the entertainment dollar and there are a lot of other entertainments out there. Professional sports and just video games take up the time of many potential customers. Without a draw to bring in fans, horse racing is dieing. Many tracks are asking for slots to bring in people to the track and then they will gamble and tracks can offer larger purses and attract top trainers and horses.
As I have said before without a venue to showcase the talents of the race horse they would not exist. Just too expensive to breed and keep around.
The Triple Crown races are the only ones that are broadcast on prime TV and they only ones that non horse people ever see. A breakdown in the Preakness of a favorite is a public relations nightmare. Many people said they stopped watching races when Ruffian broke down in the match race.
That will happen from this race . PETA who want to ban all horse sports will use this in their propaganda. We have a horse park that we are trying to create from the Naval Academy old diary farm and not getting any support from the local politicians. More and mpore the countiesare getting less horse friendly. Bike trails but not horse trails. Development breaking up the trails that people have used and created are getting destroyed.
I see that a vibrant race track creates a more friendly environment for other horse users. So we argued in favor of the sport and tried to show the improvments.
I regret that you seemed to feel that we have tried to impose are view. WE just wanted you to listen and maybe our arguement could persuade you. You have been willing to respond but started to get upset.
So everyone, lets back off and remember that almost all the people on this thread love horses
Good post. And I definately agree that a that a vibrant race track creates a more friendly environment for other horse users.
It increases the skill and knowledge base available to local veterinary resources, the skill and and talent in horse-shoing, and even the availability of terrific TB pleasure horses.
Thanks for your insight.
But he is standing AND eating!
That's good ,no?
Very good indeed :~D
I'm gonna share this prognosis with AnAmericanMother;
"I can't wait for a snap of him with the cast off, frolicking and snorting and showing off in the middle of a nice green paddock with a bevy of mares in attendance, hanging their heads over the adjoining fence and saying, "Ooooo . . . isn't he cute!"
And I was thinking about this today
Wouldn't it be great if a foal of Barbaro ends up winning the Triple Crown?
Barbaro's Encore, Triple Crown winner! LOL
I told my mare all about it, and she has selflessly volunteered to cheer Barbaro up . . .
What a trooper your mare is!
LOL
It's always entertaining when she's in season. Miss Lydia Languish. Fortunately my trainer no longer has a stallion in residence.
I lashed out at the powers in the sport out of frustration and sorrow. You mention the PR nightmare Barbaro's breakdown creates for the sport, and of course you're right. But where I'm coming from is this: We've been in the TV age since the 1950's, when the sport was still much more popular and well-attended than it is today. The powers in the sport have known for a long, long time the potential damage horse breakdowns on TV could do. And yet, as an industry, they have done nothing. Please understand -- this is not the same thing as saying no one does anything. Let me try to explain further.
In 1975, the worst happened when the maginificent Ruffian broke down as the country was glued to the match race between Foolish Pleasure and her. Over the last decade or so, there has been a string of breakdowns of top horses in the Triple Crown races and Breeders Cup, as you say, the only real showcases for the sport on national TV.
Of course many people do wonderful work for horses and other animals. Many people both in and out of the industry do all they can for the horses. I'm in no way disparaging individual efforts whatsoever.
But Thoroughbred racing doesn't have a nationwide governing body like the NFL, Major League Baseball, the NBA, National Hockey League, NASCAR, IRL, and even the U.S. and International Olympic Committees. So as an industry, racing has no unified approach to dealing with the issues we've been discussing.
Let me give you one small example directly related to what happened to Barbaro, then I'll let it go. Many question why a vet didn't check Barbaro after the false start, not to blame someone, but to try to understand the sequence of events. Few may realize that how such indicents are handled is up to the race starter and track vet, and they go by the rules of the individual track and/or racing jurisdiction. There's no uniform approach.
But what if racing had a nationwide governing body which set rules for how such incidents were to be handled? Then no one would be left guessing as to whether or not Barbaro's false start incident was handled appropriately. Do you understand what I'm getting at? Long ago the sport could have created such a governing body. So many of the sport's problems today might not exist, or if they did, perhaps they might not be as severe. We'll never know.
And BTW, you mention the state of Maryland. A large part of racing's problems can actually be laid at the foot of the state legislatures, which have habitually used the sport as a cash cow without giving anything back. The states probably make it difficult for the industy to develop a nationwide governing body.
Long ago -- at least 40 years ago that I know of for sure -- many of these issues were the hottest topic in the sport. People knew back then, at a time when the states were just beginning to permit off-track betting, that the sport would be in big trouble over time if what were then just trends continued unabated. But nothing was done at the governing level -- governing by the states and self-governing by the sport.
Now the sport finds itself in an era when top racehorses break down every few years on national TV, and the sport has no residual good will from the public to fall back on. One thing I learned through this long, painful three days, is that a new material is being installed at the major tracks here in Southern California and elsewhere. It's supposed to replace the dirt tracks and the hope is that it will cut down on injuries. This is certainly a step in the right direction.
If the sport had a nationwide governing body in place, as it should have had long ago, then it would have taken the responsibility for researching the new track surface. If it worked out in trials as hoped, the governing body could mandate that it be installed at all tracks under it's jurisdication, just like NASCAR did with safer barriers at its tracks after Dale Earnhardt's death. Even then, it took the deaths of three top drivers in a couple of years, plus career-ending injuries to others, to push NASCAR to make that rules change. This is what thoroughbred racing lacks. There is no governing body so installation of the new, hopefully safer material will be a patchwork quilt, largely left up to the individual tracks and/or racing jurisdictions.
Anyway, I've done my best to try to explain what I've been getting at. You all have asked me to listen to you, and I have. A little listening in this direction would be helpful. You know why? Because pressure from the horse-loving public might be the only thing that could get the whole rickety structure that is horse racing in this country to turn itself around. That to me would be the best tribute of all to Barbaro and all the others like him.
It's not that, as was said to me more than once these last few days, I think I'm the only one who cares. That's absurd. Instead, it's that there are a lot of cheap claimers out there few speak up for. If the sport can be improved at the top, their lives will be much better. Maybe there would never be another case such as that of Loup Masque, found "malnourished, his flanks raw with bruises that indicated abuse, his ankles swollen to the size of softballs, the horse had recently been rescued by the Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation (TRF) from a filthy stall at Boston's Suffolk Downs."
Oh, one last thing. Something good did come out of the devastating loss of Ruffian. Horse ambulances, better on-track veterinary care for injured horses, on-track hospitals at many major tracks, and better, more accessible off-track hospitals. All of it was developed directly as a result of what happened to her.
It's almost impossible to describe how amazing that filly was.
>She will flirt with ANYthing that looks like it might be male.<
I had one that would flirt with geldings.
At 3, she somehow managed to break herself AND the QH yearling in the same barn out of their respective stalls and seduced the innocent. He was rewarded by gelding the following week. I had her quickly made unpregnant.
A few years later...a few days after she jumped solid board fences to harrass some geldings...she jumped another line of fence, having to go uphill. Then she went downhill a bit, and jumped into the paddock of a 3 y o, still virgin colt and seduced him.
The people who operated this place expected me to scream when told, but it was an old story. I looked at the colt's awful legs and generally mediocre conformation (I'm not a breed snob, but there really is more to a horse than a nice head...)and decided those legs were just too scary, and took steps to prevent another pregnancy.
[When I did bless a tryst with a sufficiently wonderful boyfriend for her, an intelligent fellow of kindly disposition, imposing build, and a helluva race record, she foaled a wonderful filly with dashing zebra stripes on the legs, which alas, faded in a matter of weeks.]
>It's almost impossible to describe how amazing that filly was.<
And she did it all under the old rules, without Lasix or Butazolidin.
It's interesting to read the foreign racing press and find out what they think of "racing on allowed medication", especially in Breeders Cup races. [Not much.] Horses getting 3-4 weeks between races who must have pharmaceutical help to do so...shouldn't be racing.
Speaking of the foreign racing press, I came across this artice on the Bloodhorse.com site. It's an example of precisely what I've been talking about that's lacking here in U.S. racing. I've fought so hard here about this not to be a pain in the ass, but in hopes that people who care might raise their voices to try to make something like this happen here.
Study of Joint Injuries Among Projects Funded by Britain's Levy Board
by Mark Popham
Date Posted: 5/22/2006 9:34:11 AM
Last Updated: 5/22/2006 2:37:32 PM
Britain's Levy Board has committed 1,780,000 pounds over the next three years to veterinary research projects, including new studies into a greater understanding of the causes of joint injuries and fractures.
The study of joint injuries is timely in light of Barbaro's injury in the Preakness Stakes (gr. I). The aim of the studies are to develop practical advice to help prevent such injuries during training and racing.
Dr Tim Rankin of the Animal Health Trust in Newmarket, England, is looking into condylar fractures. These are fractures of the bottom end of the cannon bone which enter the fetlock joint and extend obliquely upwards. Such fractures occur when working at speed or racing.
Dr Rankin's research will try and find detectable markers for lateral condylar fractures so that the risk of injury can be predicted by examination of horses' legs.
In another research project, Dr Kristien Verheyen of the Royal Veterinary College in London, England, is conducting a study of joint injuries among Thoroughbreds in training to see how common they are and discover any correlations between injury incidence and training surfaces and gallop construction.
"The Board's contribution is designed to have a significant impact on the management of Thoroughbred health problems," said chairman Robert Hughes.
The Levy Board, which collects money from bookmakers, is the statutory body responsible for distributing funds for the advancement of horseracing and breeding.
Studies into Thoroughbred respiratory diseases are also set to benefit from Levy Board backing, with one project aimed at developing an innovative video endoscope system to investigate common respiratory problems under training conditions.
The Levy Board will also work in conjunction with Britain's Thoroughbred Breeders' Association to support new research into developing a test for cyathostome worm infection, which often affects Thoroughbreds at stud and can lead to colic and death.
The funding is additional to the support currently distributed by the Levy Board to the Equine Fertility Unit and the equine genetics program.
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