Kellyn Gorder - buh bye for 14 months

[Left Bank]

Originally Posted by Cannon Shell

There is next to zero chance that anyone especially a trainer in the position that Gorder is in would knowingly or intentionally give their horse meth.

The idea that a street drug, especially Meth in the state of KY (meth capital of the US) , found at the picogram level wouldn't be the result of contamination is the hard to believe part.

It is close to impossible to police your horses 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It is extremely hard to eliminate all human contact from your horses.
At the picogram level the horse could be contaminated by almost any contact. A maintenance worker from the track pees in the receiving barn stall after fixing a broken light bulb or cleaning the stall. A feed company employee. A test barn employee. Someone at the lab. Maybe the assistant trainer cashed his check before the race ad didnt wash his hands before putting on the tongue tie?

All sound a bit far fetched but a whole lot less far fetched than Gorder intentionally giving a first time in a year starter meth.
I'm amazed that people actually think that any viable trainer would try that.

The fact is that being a trainer nowdays is a nightmare. The rules are never actually spelled out for us, we virtually have no rights regardless of whether we are actually at fault, if we win too much we are suspicious, if we dont win enough we are clueless...

Often we arent getting paid for our services yet because a live animal is the the middle of this we have to keep on taking care of it to the best of our abilities or we are the bad guys. When a terrible incident like this happens despite it likely being completely out of our control, the internet judge and juries convict us instantly and we are blamed for the demise of racing and the euros disdain for our racing (they dont seem to like the NFL too much and they dont seem to worried).

Say you loan your car to your 17 year old kid to go to the mall. He picks up some of his friends and maybe one of those friends is a little shady and has a little bag of meth that he hides in the glove compartment when no one is looking. Now you get in the car and get pulled over for speeding and when you open the glove compartment out drop the little bag of meth that you had no idea was there. Cops arrest you for possession. Are you really a criminal?

Well said, Chuck.

[ne to socal]

Coming at this from a somewhat different angle (I don't know Kellyn or bet his horses)...

I'm a licensed owner, small time via a group, but nevertheless my license affords me unfettered access to the backside.

Half the reason I got into ownership is sometimes what I need to keep me sane (day job is intense) is to spend some time in the barn area with my daughters, or a friend, or alone wandering around...chatting casually with our trainers and grooms and assistants...feeding a couple carrots...picking up a curry comb for a few minutes...

The other day I was with a first timer at the track and I took her back to the barns and we came upon a farrier doing his thing and the groom waved us over as my friend was fascinated. We asked, and the groom allowed her to feed the mare a carrot (we had a bag with us). It was then I saw the name on the bridle and if it was really that horse, my friend was feeding a Grade II winner.

My point to this story? What other sport allows this kind of access? Literally a few hundred people backside who have an almost unchecked access to screwing with another person's horse out of spite or some other sick stupid motivation.

Are we ready for and/or would we welcome changes where access is heavily restricted or in some cases eliminated? Who'd pay for that and is it even feasible? When my daughters were born, the hospitals used various wristbands and keycards to control access and that's for a small floor in a secure building with maybe 20 babies at once. Not a huge backside open to the air with upwards of 1000-2000 horses.

[dellinger63]

Originally Posted by ne to socal

Coming at this from a somewhat different angle (I don't know Kellyn or bet his horses)...

I'm a licensed owner, small time via a group, but nevertheless my license affords me unfettered access to the backside.

Half the reason I got into ownership is sometimes what I need to keep me sane (day job is intense) is to spend some time in the barn area with my daughters, or a friend, or alone wandering around...chatting casually with our trainers and grooms and assistants...feeding a couple carrots...picking up a curry comb for a few minutes...

The other day I was with a first timer at the track and I took her back to the barns and we came upon a farrier doing his thing and the groom waved us over as my friend was fascinated. We asked, and the groom allowed her to feed the mare a carrot (we had a bag with us). It was then I saw the name on the bridle and if it was really that horse, my friend was feeding a Grade II winner.

My point to this story? What other sport allows this kind of access? Literally a few hundred people backside who have an almost unchecked access to screwing with another person's horse out of spite or some other sick stupid motivation.

Are we ready for and/or would we welcome changes where access is heavily restricted or in some cases eliminated? Who'd pay for that and is it even feasible? When my daughters were born, the hospitals used various wristbands and keycards to control access and that's for a small floor in a secure building with maybe 20 babies at once. Not a huge backside open to the air with upwards of 1000-2000 horses.

Great point. When Dee Tee had Sumwonlovesyou with Cannon virtually every person on this board along with friends and family had access to her and fed her daily. I remember someone actually baked her a cake and wanted to feed that to her. That mare got fed so many mints Chuck made a joke about her developing diabetes.

It's simply impossible for a trainer and his workers to watch every horse 24/7.

Bottom line with Kellyn in particular is if the horse was administered meth as a race enhancer it would not have been shown in the minute quantity it was and if it had been administered in previous days it would have limited the horse's performance. Ever see a meth user come down?