Santa Anita Injuries; Trainers meet, complain

[Danzig]

Vienna later stated, “After this meeting, I have no confidence that Ian Pearse can fix this track. Trainers don’t want to drive off owners by saying these tracks are no good, but the problems we had with dirt tracks haven’t been cured. We still have the disease, just with different injuries. The trajectory of these synthetic surfaces is they get worse over time.”

Extra maintenance may not necessarily work on Santa Anita’s surface, because, trainers say, the harrowing equipment tends to break up the track’s ingredients.

“They are going to try and manipulate the track to make it work,” said Vienna. “We should be planning to put in a better one; doing the groundwork to find out what works and is sustainable. Synthetic surfaces are not sustainable.”



it's not as tho these surfaces can be completely changed out year to year. the cost would be astronomical. things is, these synthetics work overseas--has anyone bothered to compare the amount of runners a day over there to the amounts over here? i bet they don't compare. we all know that euros mostly run on turf, that most of their turf meets are short, as a turf course can't survive a lot of racing. i think the sheer volume here is the main problem with these tracks. they aren't maintainable, they have too much traffic on them to last for very long.
it's a huge mess.

and i also think cannon has a point. only in the last few years have people paid much attention to injuries/fatalities. i wonder if the %'s have changed over the years.