This is great stuff!!

[GenuineRisk]

Harry D raced 20 times in 81 days? Did I read that right? Wow.

[Calzone Lord]

Originally Posted by GenuineRisk

Harry D raced 20 times in 81 days? Did I read that right? Wow.

They didn't mess around in those days.

Seabiscuit made 35 starts by November 11th of his two-year-old season and was one of the most well traveled and accomplished older horses in racing history.

The worktabs were equally wild. They'd put them through a meat-grinder schedule and have them work every three days.

Horses were demanded to be tough and campaign hard. As shown above, some of the major tracks wouldn't even accept the entry of a horse who showed visable signs of bleeding after a race.

I would think trainers and vets would be more skilled with a bleeder in no-lasix early 1990's New York or Europe today. In the old days they appearently did stuff like tying horses uncomfortably with their heads forced upward all day as a method to hopefully prevent bleeding. Today, they probably have a more expensive alternative to lasix that would help them not bleed.

[Calzone Lord]

Here's an example of what was considered a legendary training job with a bleeder for many decades afterwards. Hermit's win in the 1867 English Derby at Epsom.




Hermit came in the Derby off of a 10-month layoff. A week before the Derby he pulled up from a workout with blood pouring from his nostrils.




Chaplin eventually won over 100,000 pounds on the race (a large sum for a betting score in 1867)




Hermit's Wiki page is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermit_%28horse%29

Hermit, who had been restricted to light cantering in the days before the race, started at odds of 1000/15 (approximately 66/1) and his appearance before the race seemed to justify his odds, as he was described as "a wreck" and "a corpse".[10]