As a casual fan with no financial investment in the industry, I can objectively state that from my outsider's perspective the problems associated with the horse racing industry are troubling. No one is okay with any horse injury or death. Horse people love and care so well for the horses.
I find it difficult to believe the major contributing factors to horse injuries today are caused by racing surface issues and improper use of medication. Advancements in equine medicine and care are drastically improved to what was available during the 20th century. Racing surfaces, if anything, are better and safer than in the 1970s and 80s. Tracks are kinder, and face strict testing. They are built with better drainage, and there aren't nearly the amount of “bull rings” and lower-level tracks in operation. These tracks lacked resources to spend on the surface or facilities.
The injury problem lies elsewhere.
When our family was breeding and racing horses in 80s, horses made more starts per year with less time between starts. Most horses started at least eight to 12 times a year. It was not unusual for a horse to race twice a month. Horses often made starts weekly. They might race 10, 15, and even 20 times per year. Kelso made nine or more starts five times. John Henry double digit starts five times and nine starts at age nine! Affirmed and Spectacular Bid made at least nine starts each of the three years they raced.
We need “throw back horses” today. There are fewer foals being born each year, and there are more “fragile” foals, percentage wise, than ever before. It's no wonder there is difficulty carding races. When you have less foals and they make less starts, the numbers will play out as we are seeing.
Forty years after their racing career, I can still recall some good “throw back horses.” Dusky Duke raced mostly in Chicago, and made 96 starts between ages two and nine and won 20 races. Our friends, the Kelleys, had a mare named Wolf Creek Girl who made 88 starts from two to eight, most of which took place at Fairmount Park. I'm not sure, but she made have made a few starts at local county fairs too, and she retired sound as far as I recall.
I remember horses campaigned in New York by Oscar Barrerra, who entered them often. One was named Starbinia, who made 31 starts at six and 24 the next year at age seven. And, by the way, he was regally bred, being by Graustark out of Never Bend mare.
We have arguably more regally bred foals born each year, but we don't have many “throwback horses” to show for it. Is it not obvious the major contributing factor in horse on-track injuries is due to having more foals from stallions (and mares) not genetically oriented to produce long-term soundness? The top stallions are bred to twice the number of mares they would have been forty years ago. So many of these stallions won big races, earned a great deal of money, but they weren't hard-knocking grinders who showed up in the entry box often. We need more “throwback horses.”
Thoroughbred industry leaders need to face reality. They can either keep breeding horses that may fetch a big price at the sale, perhaps be able to produce high speed numbers, maybe win a graded stakes, and who knows, maybe even a classic, that will race a few times a year, and if they aren't a race track casualty or broken down and sent to early retirement, sent to the breeding shed to reproduce their own fragility, and go out of business as the pressures mount from animal rights activists, or they can look for the “throwback horses” that have always been the backbone of every aspect of the Thoroughbred industry.
Brett Beasley
Fan of Thoroughbred Breeding and Racing
Creal Springs, Illinois
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