Mullins and O'Neill Suspended

[Riot]

Originally Posted by Scav

Comedy that Illinois busted O'Neil.

The overage is 1.9% over the normal rate. TGJB has mentioned what the normal CO2 level is in a horse, gonna try and dig that up on their board.

Illinois has SUPER TESTING this year, every race. Should be AWFUL interesting if it does a bit of good.

It varies, usually between 34 to 36 mmol/L, and many things can and do cause variance on a daily basis: feed being eaten, humidity of the air, Lasix use, when the horse is sampled in the cooling out process, etc.

The overage amounts are set high enough so that there really is only one reason - illegal supplementation - that they are high.

However - "normal" levels are established along a bell-shaped curve, and yes, it is entirely possible for a small, small percentage of animals to be high normally. That is easy proven by retesting the animal.

It is also possible that slightly sloppy testing procedures and handling of the samples causes erroneous results. Attention to detail and strict procedures eliminates lab errors.

Unfortunately, some believe that TCO2 levels should be published, because some believe that if a TCO2 level in one horse is higher than the TCO2 level in another horse - although those levels are within the normal physiologic variences established by laboratories (we do test TCO2 in some ill animals, too) - that can indicate "help" that isn't high enough to be outside the allowable levels. That is a dangerous and wrong thing to do, IMO.