This will effectively kill horse racing

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by Thoroughbred Fan

First, horse racing is a brutal sport. They are a selected breed. They are inferior when it comes to health and soundness, but they are fast. In the US we have taken this selection way too far and patched the animals genetics with meds.

Animals get sick, injured and even die. It is a fact of life. I do think we should medicate where necessary (antibiotics, steroids, etc.) to help the animal. However, if these rules go in effect, then it may require the horse to be absent from the races for some time for the meds to leave his/her system.

In Europe, they race with less meds and it doesn't kill their racing. The bottom line is they breed a sounder animal, race primarily on turf, and at a longer average distance.

In the US, this will be painful for a few years, but eventually it will be fine, maybe even better than fine. I'd like for the US to breed heartier types and eliminate the bleeders and the glass horses from the stock. This may reduce the overall number of horses and bring the industry to the size it should be.

Most trainers probably do their best to play within the rules, but the policing will never be good enough without a black and white rule set. No is no.

I don't have all the answers, but as an owner and bettor, I sure wish the sport were holding itself to a higher standard than today.

The problem is that you are buying into fiction that just isn't true or won't happen.

European racing is completely different than ours and this bill will make the law here far stricter than there. Let's not kid ourselves and think that horses there arent treated with meds as well as they are here. The biggest difference obviously is Lasix and THAT is a completely overblown topic in and of itself.

The "genetics" of racehorses here and in europe are the same. Meds have zero effect on the genetic capability of a horse. While you might make the case that a stallion using meds may get a better chance and breed more mares for a few years the fact is that the vast majority of stallions are failures with few notable exceptions and their genetic capability was there or not there regardless of what they were given. Mares with good/decent pedigrees are going to be bred regardless of whether they bled, ran horrible or were cripple. And a lot of them turn out to be great producers who don't pass on any of their negative traits. Bleeding is not an inheritable trait. There is no "bleeding" gene. The fact is that most incidents of EIPH are caused by outside factors whether it is an infection, reaction to trauma, pain, anxiety or some other issue like hitting the gate or falling down. Bleeding is rarely a primary issue, generally it is a symptom. Now once a horse damages its lungs, bleeding can become a regular occurrence which makes taking away means to control the bleeding seem to be a bad idea.

But hey a lot of people believed the word was flat at one time too...