animal rights | Horse Racing Free Tips

`The World Awaits.’ Letter to the Editor from Grant Pritchard-Gordon

Raceday fatalities create powerful news stories anywhere. Social Media has ensured that our world of racing is now a global community, with news and videos dispatched within minutes to knowledgeable audiences in countries far beyond the American shores. However, shock will have reverberated throughout horse communities of many nations at the recent tragedies that have occurred on the racetracks at Saratoga and Churchill Downs. We all wait with bated breath to hear the steps that the major U.S. racecourses will take to remedy a very challenging moment for our sport, industries and livelihoods. It is essential that the boards of the racecourse groups make both speedy and correct decisions, for their actions will impinge on the lives of all horsemen and women far beyond the US of A.

In the past year, nearly every major racing nation has suffered the unwanted attention of idealistic and disruptive 'animal rights' activists. If not actually detailed in agenda meetings, the subject of Welfare has been the elephant in the room for practically every board of directors/trustees of racing and breeding activities around the world. If American racetracks make the wrong decision, then these elephants will grow into dinosaurs for everyone. Maintaining the status quo and traditions of US Racing is unlikely to be an option, for these diligent activists feast on statistics to bend an interpretation to their own agenda. However, there is strong statistical evidence out there to suggest that there is a more acceptable solution, as highlighted recently by Mark Casse and Graham Motion.

There is little doubt that the 'animal rights' activists in Europe or Australia mimic and use similarly informed campaigns to like-minded individuals in America. Their disruptive ambitions will have been reinforced by the horrific experiences viewed by huge numbers of racegoers at Saratoga and Churchill Downs. When the time suits them best, provocative agendas will inevitably be pumped into the world of social media by re-fueled keyboard warriors. A resulting tsunami of unwanted activity will surely ensue at our major racing festivals. US Racecourse boards and executives have the tools in their hands to change the narrative. The world awaits.

Now is the time for the owners, breeders, trainers, jockeys, stable staff and associated bloodstock trades of America to make their voices heard loud and clear by racecourses. They have the support from thousands of like-minded and employed people from around the world. The wrong decision from racecourses could create an existential threat to a wonderful global industry and community.

Grant Pritchard-Gordon is a U.K.-based bloodstock agent, and the principal in Badgers Bloodstock Consultants. He is the former longtime racing manager for Juddmonte Farms.

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Congressman Demands Investigation Into Derby Week Fatalities

In a letter released to the media Friday afternoon, U.S. Representative Earl Blumenauer (D-Oregon), along with 15 bipartisan supporters, are urging the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority (HISA) to launch an investigation into the equine deaths at Churchill Downs earlier this month.

Addressed to HISA CEO Lisa Lazarus, Blumenauer's letter requests a response within 60 days and makes note of figures from the Equine Injury Database showing that between 2009 and 2021 some 7,274 Thoroughbred fatalities have occurred on American racetracks.

The Congressman urges HISA to make the findings of any investigation public, and encourages the group to review the horses' necropsies and medical records–which has been a standard part of mortality reviews in Kentucky for years and is spelled out in the existing HISA racetrack safety rules.

This story was first reported by The Paulick Report. Click here to read a copy of the letter.

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Commentary: How Will Evolving Public Morality Affect Horse Racing’s Future?

Thoroughbred Racing Commentary contributor Daniel Ross wrote this week of the evolution of public attitudes and how they can and will affect the future of the sport of horse racing. He considers the public embarrassments racing has endured in just the past few years, from the spate of deaths at Santa Anita to the photograph of trainer Gordon Elliott astride a dead horse, and asks why those instances have garnered such intense media attention, while others, perhaps equally as egregious, have fallen by the wayside.

Ross writes: “Why, for example, has disciplinary action been metered out by the sport's regulators to Elliott but not to Sheikh Mohammed, whose wife fled to London allegedly fearing for her life, and who has been accused of kidnapping and imprisoning his daughter? Is one action more morally repugnant than the other?”

And: “If, for example, the broader media is genuinely incensed by mistreatment of horses for sport, where are all the column inches devoted to the ongoing problem of match racing in the U.S., an unregulated and illegal activity notorious for prodigious drug use?”

He posits that both the prevalence of social media and the presence of well-funded animal rights campaigns may be behind the impetus for horse racing to change how it views the importance of public perspective.

Ross concludes: the sport of horse racing “still gets to write its own story. Which one, however, will it choose?”

Read more at the Thoroughbred Racing Commentary.

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Protestors Shut Down Racing at Golden Gate

The Thursday racing card at Golden Gate Fields was on hold after animal rights protesters ran on to the track before the first race and locked themselves together with interlocking pipes over their arms. The first race was scheduled to go off at 12:45 p.m. Pacific Time. As of 4:45 p.m. local time, one hour after the last race was scheduled to go off, no races had been held and the protestors remained on the track.

The protest was staged by a group called Direct Action Everywhere, which live-streamed the goings-on on their Facebook site, including drone footage of the protestors lying on the track, before signing off just after 4 p.m. PT. The group is based in the Bay Area.

According to Cassie King, a spokesperson for the group, the four individuals were locked together to form a human blockade. They were connected by heavily weighted pipes, according to a press release from the organization.

The protestors ran onto the track at about noon, climbing what Direct Action Everywhere said was a 7 1/2-foot fence and lying on the track on the far turn. On video shown from drone cameras, the four activists waited until the harrows had passed before the first race before scaling the chain link fence, carrying the interlocking pipes. After they lay down on the track, they attached themselves to one another with the pipes. On the video, one of the harrow drivers ran up to them and tried to stop them from locking arms, but was unable to do so.

“Their goal is to be there long enough so that they can't race today,” King said. “The first race was scheduled to go off at 12:45 and that obviously hasn't happened because they haven't moved them yet. Our bigger goal, which we are trying to get support behind, is to shut down Golden Gate Fields permanently.”

At about 1:20 p.m., police officers or security personnel were on the track hovering over the protestors but didn't seem prepared to take any immediate action.

“The activists in this blockade are prepared to be arrested,” King said.

Direct Action Everywhere describes itself as “a global network of activists working to achieve animal liberation in one generation.” Their website says that their 'accomplishments' to that end are rescuing hundreds of animals from slaughterhouses, laboratories and other places of violence, mobilizing thousands to take action in hundreds of cities worldwide, and passing legislation such as the fur ban in Berkeley and San Francisco that led to California banning it statewide. Their website says they have 30 chapters across the U.S. and Canada.

The group's goal, she added, was to end horse racing in the U.S. King and the other hosts of the live Facebook feed also said that they were advocating for the land at Golden Gate be repurposed as affordable housing.

“Ending horseracing can be a powerful domino to fall toward ending all animal exploitation,” she said. “We don't want this industry in the state of California. We don't want this industry anywhere.”

King was clearly misinformed about what makes up a racing card as she repeatedly said that only two races were scheduled on the day and that the second one was set to go off at about three hours after the first. She also said that half of all Thoroughbreds bred for racing went to slaughter, also not true.

King said the group decided to take action because, she said, three horses had died there over a recent four-day period and that five had died during the current meet.

A small group of protestors gathered outside the track with banners and signs reading, “Shut Down Golden Gate Fields.” The group was also circulating a petition online to shut the track down. Some passers-by threw eggs at the group, according to the activists.

“This is obviously not just because of those four horses or five horses this season. It's the entire industry,” she said.

Golden Gate was meant to function as a COVID vaccination site today, where people were reportedly going to show up to receive their second dose of the vaccine. The site was temporarily closed due to the protests, but was opened again around 2:30 p.m. A local health site estimated the number of canceled vaccination appointments at 200.

Golden Gate Fields addressed the action over Twitter, tweeting, “Golden Gate Fields is a firm believer in the right to protest. However, the current actions of the protesters have forced the closure of the onsite COVID vaccination clinic, and hundreds of people have already had their vaccinations cancelled.

“We respectfully suggest to the activists that there is a better way to have this conversation and air their concerns. We welcome the opportunity to have this discussion in the appropriate format.”

Later in the afternoon, a portable pop-up shade tent was put up over the protestors, presumably as a goodwill gesture from Golden Gate.

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