The Week in Review, by Bill Finley
The week began with the Equine Drug Research Council, a group that makes medication recommendations to the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission, voting down a proposal to phase out Lasix, despite the fact that the changes had the support of the state's racetracks, despite the fact that Keeneland had to deal with animal rights protestors at its recently concluded meet, despite the fact that the entire sport is under siege from forces that want to see its demise.
It was the type of tone-deaf response to the current climate that is all too familiar. Lasix is not anywhere near the root of the sport's problems, but time has come for the use of the drug to end. There is a perception that the American race horse, unlike those anywhere else in the world, are fueled by drugs when racing and that that is a contributing factor to fatal injuries. The perception doesn't have to be right. It exists, and that is a serious problem for the sport.
No one wants to be writing about this today or reading about it. We wanted to celebrate a Breeders' Cup that, up to the point that Mongolian Groom (Hightail) broke down in the GI Breeders' Cup Classic, was a celebration of everything that is right with what can be a wonderful sport. We wanted to heap praise on The Stronach Group, the Breeders' Cup and the California Horse Racing Board for enacting the strictest safety standards in the history of racing and being rewarded with an injury free two-days of racing.
Instead, the conversation is dominated by the ugliest headlines imaginable. “The Death of another horse at Santa Anita mars Breeders' Cup Classic,” was the story on CNN International's website. The headline in the New York Times reads “Another Horse's Death Overshadows Vino Rosso's Win at Breeders' Cup Classic”. The Los Angeles Times weighed in with an editorial, “Horses are still dying at Santa Anita and something has to give.”
There are those who have taken action, and their efforts are commendable. Those put in charge of trying to make this an injury-free Breeders' Cup did just about everything humanly possible to see that the races were safe. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough. In April, several major tracks formed a coalition that announced an initiative calling for the gradual phasing out of Lasix, the initiative that was shot down by the EDRC.
What was their excuse? Do they really understand the severity of the situation facing the sport? It's impossible to know what motivated the five vets to do what they did, but it's likely they took a page out of what has been the sport's play book for far too long. Too many in the industry seem to be risking the sport's future amid an unrealistic belief that racing will be fine and that the current crisis will blow over.
That wasn't going to happen no matter what. Now that racing's worst nightmare–that a horse suffered a fatal injury during the Breeders' Cup–has come true, anyone who believes this is not a dire situation is hopelessly naive, only concerned with their self interests, doesn't truly love the sport or all of the above.
No matter what lengths are taken, racing will never eliminate fatalities. That leaves it clinging to the only defense it can offer, that it will pull out every stop to reduce the number of deaths.
In its Sunday editorial, the Los Angeles Times was not wrong when it wrote, “The idea is to institute reforms that bring down fatalities dramatically. Death should not be a regular or acceptable by-product of horse racing.”
We already know what the reforms must be. American racing must join the rest of the world and eliminate race-day medications. The template provided at Santa Anita by The Stronach Group, which implemented vigorous pre-race and pre-workout examinations by a team of veterinarians as part of a meaningful effort to reduce injuries, must be standard operating procedure at every racetrack in North America. Because the general public does not accept the whipping of race horses, whipping must be abolished. Synthetic racetracks are safer than dirt tracks, so they must replace dirt surfaces and become the norm instead of the exception. Trainers must be scrutinized and those who still want to push the envelope must be rooted out of the sport.
The Los Angeles Times's editorial also called for racetracks to have a central pharmacy to distribute medications, security cameras in all barns and the use of CT scanners that can take images of all four of the horse's legs at once. These are not irrational demands from a fringe group, but a sober assessment of the situation from the editorial board at one of the most respected newspapers in the world.
You don't even have to agree with the Los Angeles Times or the constant anti-racing coverage that has been a staple of the New York Times for well over a decade. Many won't. But the inescapable fact is that racing's future eventually will be decided not by industry insiders but by the voters, by the court of public opinion. In an era where people no longer tolerate what they perceive to be the abuse of an animal and the deaths of 37 horses this year at Santa Anita has been front-page news, that is a frightening thought.
Saturday was a terrible day for horse racing, and more is surely yet to come. We have heard from an unsympathetic media and, of course, from PETA. A worse body blow is about to come from influential politicians.
Surely, Senator Dianne Feinstein will have something more to say. Her initial comments were damning enough last week as she sent a letter to the CHRB Executive Director Rick Baedeker which read, in part, “I believe this weekend presents a critical test for the future of horseracing in California and in the United States,” she wrote. “If horseracing cannot be conducted in a safe and humane manner that protects the life and safety of horses and jockeys, it may be time to reexamine the future of this sport in our state and in our country.”
Likely, California Governor Gavin Newsom will be heard from again. In September, he told the New York Times, “I'll tell you, talk about a sport whose time is up unless they reform. That's horse racing. Incredible abuses to these precious animals and the willingness to just spit these animals out and literally take their lives is a disgrace.”
These are powerful people who have the ability to do irreparable harm to the sport of horse racing. How do we fight back? There is only one way, to not just vow to change, but to actually change. This is not going to go away.
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