That does nothing to heal previous damage, unless I'm misunderstanding the properties of this miracle drug.

Your assertion that lung damage does affect performance, just not enough to make our horses win, doesn't really hold up under scrutiny. Races over long distances are decided by very small distances. Even a tiny decrease in performance would cost a horse a few lengths. Maybe if horses raced a hundred times it would start to be a factor, but they don't.

so the fact that euro's train on lasix means nothing to you?

You are reaching conclusions through information that you are just assuming.

If you are trying to tell me horses run as often now as they did even 20 years ago, you are just being foolish. Check out Todd Pletcher's ridiculous comments on freshening El Padrino. They are very telling about the state of the game today.

If owners, and trainers, want to worry about losing races, that is their problem. It will ruin the game. That kind of thinking is the biggest reason starts are shrinking. It has nothing to do with 2yo horses being counted. It is very short sighted of owners to think this way. Who gives a sh!t about win percentage? You can't win money in the barn. The less horses race, the more fragile they seem to become. I'm sure any athlete in any other sport in the world would be more prone to injury if they rarely compete.

Most of them don't train on Lasix.

questions that i have with regards to bleeding.

In theory, could dirt racing cause a horse to bleed more often than turf racing? with all the kickback in dirt racing.. could dirt or dust go into the horses lungs and cause it to bleed when maybe it wouldnt?

Also.. would sprinters be more inclined to bleed than distance horses? Could putting maximum effort through a 6 or 7 furlong race be more taxing than galloping along with a full out sprint at the end in a distance race?

No. Foreign body inhalation (although yes, that occurs, and worse on dirt than turf) does not cause Exercise Induced Pulmonary Hemorrhage. Particles of dirt and dust cannot physically enter the parts of the lung (the alveolar-capillary interface) where EIPH occurs. They are too big.

EIPH is thought to be caused mainly by huge pressure differences that occur during maximal exercise between the capillaries of the lung (oxygenation) blood system and the alveoli (air sacs) in the lungs, and physical damage (sheer) in the dorsocaudal lung lobes due to forelegs pounding during intense exercise.

Yes. More intense exercise, maximal respiratory effort by the horse, is associated directly with EIPH.

A hard dirt track seems to induce more EIPH than a soft turf course, but that's observational. EIPH is associated with maximal respiratory effort and physical pounding, no matter the discipline, hemisphere or breed of horse.

Small airway disease resulting from inhalation of environmental contaminants is not thought to cause or exacerbate EIPH?

No I am telling you that there are far greater forces that affect the number of starts than lasix.

Hello? It will ruin the game? What do you think has been happening?

You obviously havent been paying close enough attention to the trends of the last 20 years. I know you have been but you are just being stubborn. Of course it is shortsighted of owners to think this way but that what they have been doing!!!!! Lukas get a lot of grief (and obviously his last 8-10 years havent been kind) but his disciples who now have a stranglehold on a huge amount of the good horses in this country dont really follow his model of success. He ran horses and ran them alot. The spacing stuff came from the sheets guys and when Frankel won everything for a few years and gave credit to this methodology everyone who could read figured this was the magic trick. Of course I'm not just talking about trainers either. There arent a handful of big owners that dont have an "advisor" whose sole purpose on life is deciding what to do with their bosses horses. Most of them wouldnt know a horse if it fell over them but they believe they can read sheets or TG's or some other methodology that tells them as soon as a horse runs a really good race you should "space" the races further or like Alpha stop running entirely. That is the exact opposite of how people felt 30 years ago. When a horse ran a big race they would want to strike while the iron was hot.

Behind a lot of this hate to lose stuff is the value of bloodstock which was a significant driver of business for the last 15 years. As soon a horse shows they can run the plot to "maximize" the horses value begins. That plan rarely includes running them where they will be challenged. Big trainers having 5 strings of horses makes it easy to transfer them to find the softest spot possible. The thing is that when owners listen to TVG or HRTV or the trade magazines, this style of management is praised and many smaller owners want to emulate that "winning" approach. Of course they dont talk about all the flameouts that are managed into oblivion (see Godolphim for multiple examples)

Of course it does. There probably arent 50 2 year olds that race this year that will run 7 times in 2012. Go back 30 years and tell me that you could say that? While I'm sure that 2 year olds have traditionally run fewer races than average 6 races a year versus 9 is a lot less difference than 1.5 versus 6.

So lung damage doesnt decrease performance? Are you really going to stand behind that statement?

In a lot of cases -- these owners would be no worse off if they had RockHardTen85 managing the stable.

It's surprising how often you see poor placement and overall management of such good and expensive horses.

I'm talking about examples more subtle than something like cluelessly running Trinniberg in the Derby -- but if some of these owners really do have people managing placement -- they wouldn't be any worse off if they just left it up to the trainer and cut out a middle man.

And the in-race tactics they use are often brutally incompetent. They make the placing look genius by comparison.

Yes, small airway disease such as chronic inflammation, allergy does exacerbate EIPH. Yes, environmental contaminants (air pollution, ammonia in air from stall, chronic dust in air from straw/hay) can cause small airway disease.

Dirt in the airways from inhalation racing doesn't get down to the bronchioles, let alone alveoli. It stays in the first 4 generations of lung branching (in the trachea and major bronchi) and is readily moved up and out by cilliary action in most cases. Not a big contributor to airway inflammation. Just like dirt inhaled into your nose when you dirt bike or run in a dusty place is snotted out readily, and doesn't give you an asthma attack. Dust in the air doesn't get down there, either. A particle has to be particular micron size to make it down there. Nature's design is good.

So horses at racing speed, where ventilation is dramatically increased, are not possibly inhaling bacteria, viruses, or other organic or inorganic matter of the requisite size while taking in clods of dirt in a cloud of kickback?

and they also send bleeders elsewhere when they discover them. they aren't kept where they can't race on lasix, and therefore won't suffer damage as they get race day treatment, not just training days.

Bacteria, viruses and other organic and inorganic matter are of markedly different sizes, and thus are only capable of reaching certain places within the lungs.

As EIPH is not caused by the presence of bacteria, viruses and other organic and inorganic matter, their presence is not directly contributory.

Lower airway inflammation that affects the integrity of the alveolar-capillary interface and constriction of bronchioles (that can be contributory to EIPH caused by pressure difference) is different from upper airway inflammation, and organic and inorganic matter are rarely, if at all, associated with lower airway inflammation.

Bacteria and viruses can cause infection with subsequent scarring if they are respiratory pathogens and are inhaled, not removed by immunologic and physical defense systems, and set up housekeeping within the lungs. That takes at least 6 hours or longer, thus inhalation during a race is not contributory to EIPH that occurs during that race.

A previous episode of lung infection/pneumonia, if it causes scarring or lung damage, can in the future make the horse more susceptible to dorso-caudal lung lobe problems, however that is not the most common location within the lung of infection/pneumonia.

Medicine: it takes a thorough in-depth knowledge of normal anatomy and physiology before one can start identifying and speculating upon the abnormal.

Do you have a point, or are you just dancing for Freddy?

As expected, you masterfully backpedaled from your earlier absolute that inhalants from racing don't affect EIPH. Antitrust had a good point that perhaps racing on dirt predisposes horses more to bleeding than on natural grass courses. No one said anything about bacteria, et al directly causing EIPH, nor suggested that inhaling kickback immediately led to EIPH in the same race. Only the notion that lower airway inflammation, for which many different microscopic sources found in dust/kickback are responsible, can exacerbate bleeding was offered. Seems like you agree even though your original response read the opposite way.

You're welcome.

No, I did not. That you are clearly unable to understand the difference between foreign body/particulate inhalation and inflammation due to COPD/allergy; and what different parts of the airway these processes affect, and what the multiple contributors to EIPH are and are not, is not my fault.

I tried to make the explaination simple. It was clearly not simple enough for you. Try reading it again. I'm sorry you didn't understand it the first time.

I'll try again, like I was speaking to a smart-azz but not-very-bright third grader: kickback on the track = big pieces of stuff = not inhaled deeply enough past trachea and bronchi into bronchioles = doesn't cause inflammation = doesn't even get to physical location where "inflammation" can happen = doesn't cause narrowing of small airways = doesn't cause changes in lung pressure = doesn't cause EIPH

Small particles such as viruses and bacteria: even if they get down into airways = their action not immediate = no they don't cause EIPH at end of race = won't even cause EIPH subsequently as different part of lung than EIPH location most usually = will only affect anyway subsequently if permanent scarring

The above has nothing to do with lower airway inflammation caused by inflammatory mediators (not the actual particulate matter) - it appears your ignorance lays here, in your lack of knowledge about COPD and what "inflammation" is and the pathways that cause it. You obviously mistakenly think it's particulate matter directly into the lungs that causes problems. You are wrong. You are confusing two different things in your ignorance.

Oh, here: I found a little 13-page article reviewing the very basic inflammatory cascade found in allergic lung diseases (its for human but it applies to the equine), so you can learn how that has nothing at all to do with "dust particles in the lungs" as you wrongly think: http://www.cardam.eu/NR/rdonlyres/.....rmediators.pdf

You're welcome. ROFLMAO.

If it does, then these horses shipping in from Europe that don't race with Lasix over there don't have any.

Before I read the rest, I already said "I'm not suggesting banning Lasix is going to do that either (re: increase field size)". How did you come to the conclusion I was saying that?

ALL horses run less, a lot less. Trying to blame it on two year olds starting less just seems a bit ridiculous to me. Seriously, you aren't trying to say 2yo start less, but all other horses run about the same are you? Really? Please tell me I'm misunderstanding something here.

As for the rest, I'm not even sure you why you bothered. I don't disagree with any of this. Of course I know it has been going on for 20 years and is dragging down the game. Nobody wants competition any more. It is sad.

But 93% of all horses bleed. Obviously all the bleeders don't get sent here, only the worst ones. Are you trying to say most of the G1 winners that shipped in from overseas are part of the magic 7%?

What percentage of Euro horses train on lasix? I bet you it is an extremely low percentage. In the US, there is a small percentage of trainers that train practically all their horses on lasix. I'm sure there are a few trainers over in Europe that do this too, but I can guarantee you that it is not a large percent.

That whole thing about 93% being bleeders is totally misleading. A high percentage of those cases is microscopic bleeding. Microscopic bleeding is not going to affect performance at all. That is not to say that microscopic bleeding is necessarily totally insignificant. It could get worse and progress into something more significant over time. It would be something to keep an eye on but there is a good chance that it will never develop into anything significant.

Once you read Dr Riot, the failed hack vets, reply below I suspect you will realize you are dealing with a superior talent. You have too understand she has been bounced from some of the worst producing barns in KY. Remember some day in Buenos Aries you could be a star!!!!

Some people think that lasix is one of the reasons why horses run less now than they did 30 years ago. I don't know whether this is true or not. I think it is certainly a reasonable hypothesis. I know that you do not think it is true.

My question to you is whether you think the opposite is true. Do you believe that the advent of lasix has actually increased the number of starts per horse, per year (when the other factors that have decreased starts are taken out of the equation)? If everything Riot says about lasix is true, lasix should actually increase the number of starts per year, per horse. Yet I think that all the evidence points to the opposite. Sure there may be other reasons why starts per year have gone down. But I still think the best case scenario is that lasix has had no effect on number of starts per horse, per year. If it has no effect, then I think all the supposed positive benefits are overstated. We know that when a horse bleeds in a race, that horse will need extra time off before his next race. If lasix is doing such a great job of preventing bleeding, then you would expect that lasix would lead to more starts per year, per horse. There is no evidence that this has happened. If anything, the evidence points to the opposite.

Oh, I'm aware. We all know why it became worth finding...to get Lasix, and not because it stops microscopic bleeding.

Wrong. I cannot understand why you stick your fingers in your ears and keep repeating this blatant falsehood, page after page. It's like saying dinosaurs walked the earth with humans.

Bleeding detected on tracheal wash - seeing blood cells - EIPH - is definitive evidence that each ruptured, bleeding alveoli can no longer exchange oxygen and carbon dioxide.

It's called, "early diagnosis".

You saying that EIPH doesn't matter until so much microscopic bleeding accrues that it is grossly visible to the naked eye is patently false and absurd. That's as ridiculous as saying bleeding from an amputated leg doesn't matter until you lose so much blood you pass out. It's the same as saying congestive heart failure drowning you in pulmonary edema doesn't matter until you pass out from lack of oxygen.

What percentage of lung volume can be lost before it "affects performance"? 3% 10%? 20%

It doesn't matter until hundreds of thousands of alveoli are ruptured and the horse is literally drowning?

That's beyond absurd. It's made up non-science. And it's a terrible thing to do to a horse. You'll deliberately run a horse through EIPH until it bleeds visibly? That's animal cruelty.

And yes - when your lungs start filing with blood, it affects your performance. Even before it comes up your trachea and out your nose.

At this point, it's pretty apparent that cmorioles, Rollo, and Rupert absolutely refuse to change their opinion about in the face of all fact to the contrary.

It's a sad, sad day for racing, when pushing a decidedly minority and disproven opinion is more important than doing what's best for race horses.

Racing is owned by rich, out-of-touch, ignorant old men who are more worried about their egos and power and demonstrably don't give a damn about the welfare of the horse.

Well, it's on your backs, cmorioles, Rollo and Rupert. You now take personal responsibility for your strong opinions, and forcing a substandard and dangerous medical practice on race horses in the face of overwhelming veterinary opposition to your decision.

We veterinarians, in overwhelming numbers, the ones that know medicine and EIPH, have told you the truth, and how wrong you are. But because you don't like to hear opposition to your decisions and your power, you call us hacks, accuse us of lying, accuse us of being as heartless as you are, accuse us of making decisions based upon money rather than caring for the health and welfare of the horse.

Screw you.

The first horse you force to run without lasix, that suffers at your hands, we'll be pointing directly at you when PETA comes for the sport and it's all over. It shouldn't take long.

First, horses still bleed with Lasix, it isn't a cure all. So spare me "the first horse to bleed..." BS.

Second, as I've said a few times and been ignored, there are plenty of horsemen doing FAR worse things to horses than denying them Lasix.

There are plenty of not rich men that don't give a damn either.

You act as though without Lasix horses will be struggling to finish with blood spewing from their nostrils. Funny, I spent 5 years overseas and traveled to many racetracks around the world. I don't recall seeing many horses in distress from bleeding. It can be controlled without a drug obviously.

You say there are many worse problems out there and this isn't an issue. Maybe it isn't. But I don't see horsemen, as a group, campaigning for any of those things that could help the game. They do nothing that isn't in their own interests, ever. Sure, you get a few guys like Chuck that have a good grasp of things, but apparently they have no status among their peers.

Therefore, I have trouble believing this cry to keep Lasix is all about the horse. It isn't, it never is. You'll have to excuse me me if I don't care if they are a little inconvenienced by people that want drug free races.

Lasix decreases the incidence and severity of EIPH in the race horse. Proven effective beyond a doubt no matter how often you call "BS". So essential to the health and welfare of the horse, that it's the only therapeutic drug the united veterinary world says should be allowed to be administered on race day.

You're right. It's about a powerful few in racing angry that the veterinary world has the audacity to tell them they are wrong. How dare the underlings speak up! They pay our salaries!

Yes, it's all about our "convenience". Not about the horse. Same old "discredit the messenger" straw man.

When being lasix-free causes horses to suffer, we'll be sure to point directly. at. you. Who will you blame then? The medical world is on record, publicly saying you are wrong. Who will you blame? Hey!

I'll bet it will be those horrid trainers, and their evil veterinary accomplices, using all those "illegal drugs we can't detect"!

After all, you eliminated "scourge of steroids" three years ago, and look at how the sport has changed ... oh. Whoops. Never mind. Guess that's why lasix is being attacked now.

Hint: maybe go after illegal drugs, but more importantly, abuse of currently legal drugs. Through .. testing! Yeah! Testing! Rather than picking on drugs that help horses?

But wait, that costs money ... guess we'll just go back to eliminating lasix. Damn! Racing would be so perfect for the rich, old powerful white men, if only it were not for the trainers and veterinarians and public bothering them.

Oh, yeah - there are living creatures, horses, involved, too.

I'll worry about it after horses like Anew are treated differently. That is a much bigger problem than bleeding, and nobody seems to care. Until then, you are all a bunch of hypocrites.

Scat Hats
 

Push this beaten to death thread to 18 pages and all recieve Scat Daddy hats...

Scat

Banning lasix is a tax cut for rich tea party koch brother republicans. For that reason alone lasix should be allowed.

Btw I am a republican and speak with integrity.

:tro::tro:

Yes. There are much bigger problems than eliminating lasix. Unfortunately the hypocrites that have made lasix a false straw man for all of racing's perceived "problems" - move up performances, declining Beyers, inability to make money in the sport, smaller fields, falling purses, the sport failing and falling from the public eye.

The hypocrites are those blaming lasix for all of that, and thinking that eliminating lasix will change any of those things. Eliminating lasix will only harm the horses.

so true, and what needs attention right now-but isn't drawing it- and imo is a far bigger concern than lasix. and no, no one else is ignoring it. matter of fact, i think that's why this thread exists. lasix has become the target-not cheaters and whatever the hell they're doing and getting away with. why is doug o'neill the winning trainer this year of the derby? why did asmussen get two hoty to train? why is patrick biancone back in business? why are trainers with positives getting the business?
and i bet it's not because of lasix. that has been and will continue to be my point. does lasix have reasons to be used? yes. so why is it the target, and not trainers with multiple suspensions, multiple positives? using god knows what?
but no, the one race day med allowed is what is being target, and that makes no sense. target the true evils, undetectable designer drugs. stiffen rules, stiffen fines, stop re-issuing licenses to cheaters. force owners to hire clean trainers, because they would be all that was left.

Like all those poor horse's that race throughout the world. So friggin sad

I've been there dozens of times with different vets when they have scoped our horses after races. Plenty of times they have said, "There was a drop or two, nothing significant and nothing that would have affected performance."

I guess all those vets that have said that don't know what they are talking about.

With regard to your analogies, I think I have a better analogy. A better analogy is when you go to an honest dentist and he tells you, "You have a tiny cavity. It's not bad and I wouldn't do anything with it right now. We can keep an eye on it and check it every time you come back (once every 6 months). There is a chance that it may get worse and if it does, we will put a filling in. But there is also a good chance that we will never have to fill this cavity." A dishonest dentist would simply tell you, "You have a cavity. We have to fill it."

It's not like eliminating lasix is an experiment and we don't know what's going to happen. How many years has there been horseracing in the United States? I don't know the answer but I think it has been well over 100 years? How many years have we been racing with lasix, maybe 30 years or so? So what is it going to be like with no lasix? It will probably be like it was 30 years ago. Is there any reason to believe that bleeding is worse now than it used to be?

By the way, just because a drug has been determined to have a statistically significant effect on a problem, that doesn't necessarily mean that the drug should be taken. For example, let's say that we test a group of people that say they have a hard time falling asleep. We test these 500 people and we determine that the average length of time it takes them to fall asleep is one hour. So then we give half the people a placebo and we give the other half a sleeping pill. We determine that the placebo group shows no improvement. It still takes them one hour to fall asleep. The experimental group shows a significant improvement. It now only takes them 50 minutes to fall asleep. So on average, the sleeping pill got people to sleep in 50 minutes instead of an hour. They fell asleep 16% faster with the sleeping pill.

So that is a statistically significant improvement. But does that mean that it is worth it for these people to start taking this sleeping pill every night? There is no right or wrong answer. It's just a matter of opinion. Some people would say that it's worth it to get to sleep 10 minutes sooner. Other people would say that there is hardly any difference between 50 minutes and an hour and there is no reason to take the pill.

It would be one thing if the sleeping pill saved the person 45 minutes. That is a huge improvement. That would be a 75% improvement. I think you could make the same argument with lasix. It would be one thing if lasix had these amazingly dramatic effects that practically eliminated bleeding. But that is not the case.