Kentucky's ongoing attempt to end racing in state proceeds..

[RolloTomasi]

Originally Posted by Cannon Shell

Horses get hurt because they are big, strong animals who are fed high test diets and honed to stay on edge. They have skinny legs and big bodies and most of the time those legs arent exactly perfectly conformed. They may have club or flat feet, be back or over at the knee, may be cow or sickle hocked. When thier foot strikes the ground the concussion isnt sent exactly up the leg through the foot in a straight line but correspondnt to the physical makeup of the feet and legs. This leads to certain area's getting more stress. A horse who is back at the knee is much more likely to sustain a knee chip than one who isnt. A horse who has flat feet is much more likely to get sore feet than one who doesn't. Horses with long pasterns are much more likely to run down/have suspensory issues than one who isn't. The surfaces that we train on in the best of times are hardly uniform from day to day, and from hour to hour, depending on the weather or even the amount of traffic on the track.

That doesnt even take into consideration internal issues like stomach issues, colic, tying up, etc.

No doubt that conformation is an important component of racehorse injury. But isn't even the most ideally conformed racehorse susceptible to injury if overworked/overraced?

Does treating minor issues with legal therapeutics, specifically for racing purposes(versus for training or recovery), enable potential overload, and potentially cause some minor injuries to become "major" ones? If that scenario is commonplace, would a ban of therapeutics (to threshold levels) from, say, 7-days out (after most horses have had their final breeze for an upcoming start) be a logical approach to controlling medication use?

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by RolloTomasi

No doubt that conformation is an important component of racehorse injury. But isn't even the most ideally conformed racehorse susceptible to injury if overworked/overraced?

Does treating minor issues with legal therapeutics, specifically for racing purposes(versus for training or recovery), enable potential overload, and potentially cause some minor injuries to become "major" ones? If that scenario is commonplace, would a ban of therapeutics (to threshold levels) from, say, 7-days out (after most horses have had their final breeze for an upcoming start) be a logical approach to controlling medication use?

Of course any horse is more likely to be injured if overworked/overraced. But that is a trainer issue not a medication issue. While I hate to break off into another tangent IMO the standards for getting a trainers license is far too low.

It isnt an exact science and never will be. Are trainers/vets using meds to keep their horses running? Yes but in many cases they arent causing the horse any real harm though like most things in this debate it is hard to quantify. Abuse and abusive practices have no place in the business but there is very little research/investigation/surveillence done to counter this. IMO it would be far more practical and productive to focus our energy towards eliminating the bad apples and people who push the envelope rather than debate something stupid like lasix.

As for the 7 day withdrawl I support it to a degree. Joint injections should not be allowed inside of 7 days in my view. That is the rule in PA and it is something that they get right. But there are many other meds that shouldnt be cut off that early plus I believe that it can be hard to set testing levels for some meds that far out accurately. Something like adequan which is given IM is best used at 48 hours prior to race to be effective. It isnt much more than a joint supplement (of sorts-laymans terms) and isnt a performance enhancer but does help keep joints healthy. Same with ulcer meds and some other things.

There is a misconception that bute or banamine is masking pain and allowing injured horses to race and breakdown. That isnt true in virtually every case especially so with banamine which used to be allowed at 4 hours out in KY. These meds have been around for a long time and they just didnt recently start causing issues. In fact the best way to get a sore horse sound enough to pass the vet is to simply not train them at all, just walk them while maintaining the same feed schedule. They will start to feel better without the work and the energy that they arent burning off will make them look like they are aggressive and feeling good like a healthy horse. Of course once they break from the gate and start pounding on those injured legs the problems begin.