I completely disagree,the concussion on soft tissues and joints is completely different, it is absorbed much more readily by the entire body, thats why the horses legs are not swelling and stocking up after running on it, they are bouncing over it as opposed to pounding their legs on the dirt.
I respect your knowledge and opinion, but I completely disagree.

who cares about public perception? do you know anything about marketing joel...I'm certain that you do since you are an authority on every other aspect of horse racing...do you not think that those who market the game and attempt on a daily basis to bring in new fans care about the way catstrophic breakdowns are portayed in the media? Whatever the end result with cheap claimers you have got to have your head up your @ss if you don't think the front office cares about the difference between what happened to this horse (who sustained a survivable injury) and say, what happened to Go for Wand.
And without the influx of new fans and bettors (who will adapt to the surface) you will eventually have no breeding industry. So ye,s maintaining a favorable public image is paramount to the survival of the sport, and if that means poly track you should get used to it.

And I completely disagree with you. :D

I would submit to all that there have been an insufficient number of races to draw conclusions about the safty of artificial surfaces. We'll know soon enough.

This post is hilarious... by the way, how is Elvis doing? :D

This horse ran on hard tracks at Gulfstream Park and wnet all up and down the eastern sea-board without any problems running his arse off in races like the Haskell at Monmouth - and yet in his first start over the Polytrack he breaks down and is done.......hmmmmmm....safer? :eek:

And I respectfully with you.

wasn't it also his first start for his new trainer?

This is exactly my point, you don't think racing on those hard tracks can just as easily have caused wear and tear and just became the proverbial straw? If he ran on nothing but Poly than you have a point, the fact is he hardly did at all.

I agree with you Larhage. I'm shaking my head thinking about it because I can't figure out how it would be better for concussion, yet worse for soft tissue. I've never had any problem with any one of my horses over the stuff. I can't think of a logical explanation. Although Cunningham Racing is extremely knowledgeable, so I'll give him a chance to explain himself. There is probably something that I am missing...

I still am a traditionalist though, and don't advocate polytrack except in those extreme circumstances and for training tracks.

It's funny that you made my point exactly...yes, I have a marketing degree, actually, and I worked in the marketing dept. at Churchill Downs Inc. for a couple of years, and as a marketing guy I would say that making outcomes of races less predictable and more phony, building champions with inferior pedigrees that like to run on rubber, ruining the tradition of our game and the classic bloodlines, and running the core customer away by telling him that all of the handicappingt tools that he acquired over a lifetime ar now all irrelvant and you have to re-learn how to play this game - I would say those are MARKETING NIGHTMARES...

You made my point exactly...the game has traded a public image nightmare on one facet for 10 public image nightmares on other levels...

Yeah, and Kelly Breen is twice the horseman that Todd Pletcher is, right? :rolleyes:

It's kind of like swimming in a way...

Swimming is very good for people (and animals) that have had an impactual injury, but the water resistance is tougher on soft tissue. I really don't know how to put it into words, but I disagree with your thought on it...

The fact is that he was fine before he ran on Polytrack....now he's retired

Well, I am basing it on my experience and don't see how in the world you could correlate training over polytrack to a swimming pool. If anything, synthetic surfaces create less resistance than dirt surfaces because of the boyancy factor. It creates less resistance to my animals anyway. Horses bounce over it, which is why so many TBs who are talented on the dirt have problems running over it.

The more a horse slips, runs off balance, and the track breaks away from him - the more prone he will miss step or over step in ways that cause soft tissue injuries.....Also, I have talked to more than few trainers who wintered at Turfway Park this past winter who came back to CD in the spring and told me that while they had less injuries with horses up front, they incurred far more injuries with horses rear ends.....pulled stifles, pulled backs, etc....you know hat happenes to a horse when his pusher is sore? He ver compensates on the front end when he runs and the over-compensation causes front-end problems to follow....

better or worse...makes no difference...they have different styles of training which can result in different outcomes for their horses...I am not saying TP broke down the horse...because that argument would make about as much sense as your argument that he broke down the first time he ran on poly, as though he wouldn't have on dirt...they are both stupid.

And because it's so buoyant, they don't hit the ground as hard, correct? What do you think happens to horses who are USED to hitting the ground hard? They will still use JUST AS MUCH effort to pick their feet up and because of that, it causes more soft injury injuries. I'm sorry, but I have to agree with Cunningham on this one.

Here's the definition for buoyant (in case you were wondering why I compared the surface to swimming):

buoyant
–adjective

1. tending to float in a fluid.
2. capable of keeping a body afloat, as a liquid.
3. not easily depressed; cheerful.
4. cheering or invigorating.

yeah, you are right, ones with no vlaue will be put down anyway.:rolleyes: