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Filly Eight Belles breaks down after 2nd-place Derby finish (has to be put down on the track)
AP via Yahoo ^ | 03 May 2008 | Beth Harris

Posted on 05/03/2008 4:21:34 PM PDT by SE Mom

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP)—The filly Eight Belles finished second behind favorite Big Brown in the Kentucky Derby on Saturday, then collapsed with two broken front ankles and was euthanized after crossing the wire.

The field of 20 horses was galloping out around the first turn at Churchill Downs when Eight Belles suddenly went down on both front legs and jockey Gabriel Saez slid off.

“When we passed the wire I stood up,” said Saez, a first-time Derby rider. “She started galloping funny. I tried to pull her up. That’s when she went down.”

An equine ambulance reached her on the track and put down the filly.

“There was no possible way to save her,” on-call veterinarian Dr. Larry Bramlage said. “She broke both front ankles. That’s a bad injury.”

Trainer Larry Jones and owner Rick Porter decided to run Eight Belles against the boys in America’s greatest race despite her never having done so before. She also was entered in Friday’s Kentucky Oaks for fillies, but instead Jones won that race with Proud Spell and set himself up to pull off the double.

Eight Belles was the first filly since 1999 to run in the Derby; the last to win was Winning Colors in 1988. She didn’t press 2-1 favorite Big Brown down the stretch, and he drew away to a 4 3/4 -length victory.

(Excerpt) Read more at sports.yahoo.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Front Page News; US: Kentucky
KEYWORDS: bigbrown; eightbelles; filly; horseracing; kentuckyderby
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To: NCLaw441

Hillary is long past any “filly” days. She’s well into “old mare” territory now.


61 posted on 05/03/2008 5:37:36 PM PDT by Sue Perkick (And I hope that what I've done here today doesn't force you to have a negative opinion of me....)
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To: ottbmare
"Nothing suspicious about it. Unfortunately, this sort of thing happens all too often in racing these days. We are not breeding them for soundness, only for speed."

Post #53.. Trying to educate myself so noticed your post which was helpful and related to aforementioned post. Would you then say that there would have been no warning signs to a highly paid professional who was in charge of the care of Eight Belles?

I am not trying to say anything here, just trying to understand " that this is not unusual " , just the price one's horse must pay to be champion?

62 posted on 05/03/2008 5:41:29 PM PDT by fight_truth_decay
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To: Pajamajan
This was definitely the last horse race I will watch. Too heartbreaking.
63 posted on 05/03/2008 5:41:57 PM PDT by k omalley (Caro Enim Mea, Vere est Cibus, et Sanguis Meus, Vere est Potus)
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To: KYGrandma

Oh how horrible. Just from the descriptions I couldn’t watch the video of her falling.


64 posted on 05/03/2008 5:42:23 PM PDT by Sue Perkick (And I hope that what I've done here today doesn't force you to have a negative opinion of me....)
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To: xJones

“You missed the point, the criticism was that we race them too young while their bones are still strengthening and they are more vulnerable to lower leg injuries.”

Indeed - most of these horse started racing as 2 year olds, joints not tight and still in their growing spurt.

Horse should not be stated before three.


65 posted on 05/03/2008 5:49:19 PM PDT by elpadre
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To: xJones

“You missed the point, the criticism was that we race them too young while their bones are still strengthening and they are more vulnerable to lower leg injuries.”

Indeed - most of these horse started racing as 2 year olds, joints not tight and still in their growing spurt.

Horse should not be stated before three.


66 posted on 05/03/2008 5:49:19 PM PDT by elpadre
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To: k omalley
I don't blame you for not wanting to watch any more horse races. I've got the NASCAR race on now.

I will still follow horse racing, but not for a while. Hurts too much.

67 posted on 05/03/2008 5:52:26 PM PDT by Pajamajan (Pray for president Bush. Pray for our troops. Pray for congress, Pray for our nation.)
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To: SE Mom

It’s not that unusual for the best athletes in the world to take themselves near the point of tearing or breaking their bodies. Alberto Juantarena broke his foot in an 800 meter race, ending his career. Derek Redmond tore his hamstring a bit over half way through his semi heat of the 400 meter finals at Barcelona in 1992 - it was his last chance to win gold in that theater.

Jim Wass

I strained my hamstring and withdrew 700 m into the 3000 m racewalk in the 2006 Indoor Masters National Championships while leading the 50-54 age group. Unlike the subject of this thread and the athletes I mentioned I am still competing.


68 posted on 05/03/2008 5:59:18 PM PDT by jimfree (Freep and Ye shall find.)
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To: 1rudeboy

I sure have to agree with you.That was the last fight I ever watched and I lost my interest in boxing.
I missed watching the Derby this year and do not wish to see replays of it.It certainly is tragic.


69 posted on 05/03/2008 6:00:36 PM PDT by Howe_D_Dewty
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To: elpadre
Actually, horses aren't considered full grown until they are 5 years old. Add to this the fact that all thoroughbred's birthdays are Jan. 1, no matter what date they were actually foaled on, and you've got a recipe for disaster.

The biggest problem by far though, is the breeding. They keep breeding faster, lighter built horses, with very little stamina. Big bodies on tiny legs.

If you want another example of stupid people, with too much money, completely screwing up an animal, take a look at what happened to the German Shepard dog. It's a crying shame.

70 posted on 05/03/2008 6:01:34 PM PDT by Pajamajan (Pray for president Bush. Pray for our troops. Pray for congress, Pray for our nation.)
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To: xJones
There's a reason the Lippizan stallions that perform airs above ground and manuevers that would make most people pull a groin muscle are at their prime at 26. They're not introduced to a saddle until they're 3!

My wife has a Hanoverian gelding who turned three years old a couple of weeks ago. He was US horse of the year in the breed classes back when he was a colt. She has not yet been on his back and only recently started working him in hand. The Thoroughbreds are simply being trained and raced too young IMHO.

71 posted on 05/03/2008 6:02:23 PM PDT by KevinB (John McCain is to the Republican Party as James Taylor is to the the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame)
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To: berdie

Back in the eighties I had a couple of brood mares and ttheir progeny. They were called “cheap claimers” in those days and raced at Ellis, Turfway, Churchhill and River Downs. One Sunday morning I had a call from the trainer that one was euthanized at Churchill while galloping. He said he stepped in a hole or soft spot in the track and broke a leg. The trainer was weeping, me too.


72 posted on 05/03/2008 6:05:21 PM PDT by elpadre
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To: KevinB

Reminds me of gymnasts,,they push them too hard to young and they end up dwarfed and just suffering on accouhnt of the pushing. And all young athletes,,they just push them too young.


73 posted on 05/03/2008 6:06:31 PM PDT by cajungirl
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To: SE Mom

That jockey killed that filly just as sure as if he had taken out a gun and shot her.

I’ve seen enough fixed horse races in my time, but I didn’t know until today that the Kentucky Derby could be bought. That filly wanted to win today, you could see it in her before the race. Just as Big Brown passed her, her jockey pulled up on her so hard he spun her head to the right.

Crowd favorite+longer odds than Big Brown+paid off jockey=dead horse


74 posted on 05/03/2008 6:27:05 PM PDT by anonsquared
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To: I still care

She would have been running on adrenaline. I thought on first sight that she looked a lot younger than the colts — maybe I saw an old picture — but she just did not look as mature developmentally.

That said, thoroughbreds are definitely started too young and the Derby’s mile and a quarter is a long haul for 3 year olds.


75 posted on 05/03/2008 6:32:44 PM PDT by Cloverfarm (Children are a blessing ...)
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To: SE Mom

I don’t think I will ever watch horse racing any more. I’ve seen too many in my life that have had a terrible impact...Ruffian, then of course, Barbaro (my hometown favorite),now Eight Belles. The excitement is gone, I am just flat our sad at the loss of this beautiful animal.

So utterly sad.


76 posted on 05/03/2008 6:54:49 PM PDT by SueRae
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To: Pajamajan

Yes re: birthdays, exactly what one of the huge problems is.

You can take a January baby ad run them against a May baby, and as 2 year olds, you can be running a horse as young as 20 months against 24 month olds.. and the only criteria for most trainers is that their “knees are closed” before they start breezing them.

Too damn young and too damn fragile. They are bred for potential, not conformation or strength. They want wide chests and deep ribs for lung capacity and big hindquarters and a long hip for propulsion.

I’ve had a couple off-the-track-thoroughbreds and they all had some unsoundness that was caused by physical stress, not conformational flaw - especially one nice super-sweet and generous mare, a granddaughter of Northern Dancer.. who had a shot stifle. *sigh*

I’ll stick to my mutts and trail horses too, that industry is just way too cold-blooded for me. The warm-fuzzy stories are too far and few in between to appeal to me anymore.

When they start racing them as four-year-olds, sturdy and sound, I’ll watch again. That would actually be sporting - not like watching a race to see who will finish intact. I’m sorry - I’m really angry and heartbroken at the same time.


77 posted on 05/03/2008 7:04:36 PM PDT by Dominnae (When asked by a Persian emissary for his weapons, King Leonidas said "Come and take them.")
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To: fight_truth_decay

Many professionals of vast experience watched Eight Belles (and all the other horses in the field) with eagle eyes in the months, weeks, days, and minutes leading up the starting gate. Her trainer truly loved her—more, surely, than her owners did, as he had the daily care of her—and would have scratched her from the race if there had been the slightest hint of an unsoundness. It seems this was completely unpredictable.

Personally I would not ascribe this disaster to her competition with males. She did not get bumped or roughed up, and the same thing might well have happened if she had run in the Kentucky Oaks (for fillies) instead of the Derby. Who knows?

We who are involved with Thoroughbred horses are painfully aware of their fragility. The truth is that prey animals in general and horses in particular are not as well-engineered as predator animals (when was the last time your dog went lame?) and Thoroughbreds especially are subject to mechanical failure. This is a relatively new problem. Two hundred and fifty years ago, when the breed was being developed, the early champions like Eclipse and Hambletonian ran races of two miles in three heats. They did it wearing heavy iron shoe, carrying jockeys and saddles heavier than today’s, and without the benefits of modern feeding, conditioning, and veterinary techniques. Something has happened to the breed.

There are many people who will point to the extensive use of particular bloodlines in the modern Thoroughbred, lines that are successful on the track but do not impart strength or soundness. The Northern Dancer descendants are frequently named. Others say that we are simply breeding too many cheap Thoroughbreds without regard to soundness, and we treat them as disposable objects, to be thrown away and slaughtered if they don’t work out as racehorses.

That said, if you can find a racehorse who made it on the track past age 6, the chances are you will have a strong, sound horse who can stand up to the stresses of foxhunting or show-jumping without trouble.


78 posted on 05/03/2008 7:30:16 PM PDT by ottbmare
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To: anonsquared
Crowd favorite+longer odds than Big Brown+paid off jockey=dead horse.

Please explain to us how the jockey arranged to have both front ankles of the mare break as he was riding her. We would all be interested.

79 posted on 05/03/2008 7:33:05 PM PDT by ottbmare
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To: anonsquared

You see her reined ridiculously to the right in all the footage.

I’m beginning to believe y’all who say she was murdered.


80 posted on 05/03/2008 7:35:08 PM PDT by txhurl (crazy)
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