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Santa Anita Paddock Captain John Shear Passes At 102

Santa Anita's popular Paddock Captain, John Shear passed away Tuesday from natural causes at age 102 in a rehabilitation facility in Arcadia, according to a statement from the Shear family that was shared via a racetrack press release.

Beloved by the many fans with whom he came in contact, as well as by his fellow employees, jockeys and horsemen, Shear opted to retire at age 100 in 2021. That same year he was honored by the National Turf Writers and Broadcasters with the Mr. Fitz Award for typifying the spirit of racing.

“John will be deeply missed by countless life-long friends here at Santa Anita,” said Nate Newby, Santa Anita Senior Vice President and General Manager. “We were honored to have him as part of the Santa Anita family for more than 60 years of dedicated service and we'll never forget him.”

Born Jan. 17, 1921 in England, Shear was raised in an orphanage from age four to 14. At four feet, 11 inches, Shear, who sustained a shoulder injury while serving in an anti-aircraft unit during World War II, originally aspired to be a jockey and following the war, he emigrated to Vancouver, B.C., from where he came to Santa Anita as an exercise boy in 1954.

Shear, who was an assistant trainer when he first began working in Santa Anita's parking lot in 1961, led an amazing life and remained fit thanks to a good diet and a consistent exercise regimen.

He earned national acclaim at age 90, when on March 12, 2011, he saved a 5-year-old girl from catastrophic injury when he shielded her from a loose horse that bolted out of Santa Anita's Seabiscuit Walking Ring.

John Shear is survived by his wife, Diane and their son, Michael Shear, who said that at some point in the near future, the family would have a private ceremony in honor of his father.

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A Loving Owner Takes a Chance, Spares No Expense to Save a Claimer’s Life

Minutes after a $40,000 claimer named Jack a Rose (Midshipman) broke down in an Apr. 3 race at Parx Racing, part owner Lisa Novak got a call and was told she had two choices, have the gelding euthanized or go through with an expensive and complex surgery that may or may not save his life. She didn't see it that way. There was only one choice. She would do whatever it took to save Jack a Rose's life.

“I have so much love for him,” Novak said. “You can't just throw a life away.”

Not everyone would have seen it that way.

It was the tenth race at Parx that day, a $40,000 claimer for the type of horses who come and go without hardly anyone noticing. Trained by Michael Stidham, Jack a Rose had won two of eight career starts and earned $87,430. He would never be a stallion, be a star or make a lot of money, but Novak didn't care. She instructed the veterinary team at Parx to send Jack a Rose to Dr. Patty Hogan's clinic, where he would undergo a surgical procedure known as arthrodesis. An arthrodesis is where surgeons artificially fuse the joints through the use of ancillary devices like plates and screws.

“This horse is just so sweet, kind and intelligent,” Novak said. “I had to do this for him.”

The injury occurred in the left hind leg.

“You hear the common term breakdown injury all the time, on the newscasts and TV shows,” said Hogan, who would perform the surgery on Jack a Rose. “They are very serious injuries that happen to the ankle. It's when the horses lose the integrity of the function of the ankle whether by breaking a sesamoid or suspensory. These surgeries are difficult and they are expensive. It has a lot of complications associated with it. It's a huge investment.”

Jack a Rose on his day of admission | Hogan Equine

Performing an arthrodesis on a horse is not uncommon. Echo Zulu (Gun Runner) underwent the surgery after she broke down prior to the Breeders' Cup and so did Geaux Rocket Ride (Candy Ride {Arg}) before he was also injured while preparing for the Breeders' Cup. Echo Zulu survived; Geaux Rocket Ride did not. For those horses, the surgery made economic sense. Both had tremendous residual value and were worth far more than the cost of the surgery. No matter what happened with his surgery, Jack a Rose would never race again and could not even be ridden. He would be a pasture pet, one with no economic value.

“The people who owned this horse are working-class people who bred and loved this horse,” Hogan said. “He was a modest race horse but they didn't feel like bailing on him. They wanted to fix him even if that meant he was just going to live somewhere for the rest of his life. He has no economic value whatsoever. What they did, that kind of got to us. It was really touching that they took this to the extremes they did as responsible horse owners. Euthanasia was an absolutely reasonable choice for this kind of injury.”

And there were no guarantees that he would survive the surgery.

“There are a lot of problems with this surgery,” Hogan said. “They are prone to laminitis in the other leg. They get infections because of all the metal. There's a lot of stress and a lot of tissue trauma. It's a big undertaking. Even if you have a horse that is insured many insurance companies consider the surgery an extreme measure and they won't honor the insurance policy.”

Jack a Rose's fused ankle | Hogan Equine

Hogan normally gives a horse a break of a few days between the time they are injured and when she operates. Novak could have changed her mind, something a lot of people might have done when they started to add up the numbers. The cost of the operation plus the payments for the time the horse is laid up and recovering would come out to about $25,000.

Novak grew up in Chicago and followed racing since she was very young. The first horse she fell in love with was Timely Writer, who had to be euthanized after breaking down in the 1982 GI Jockey Club Gold Cup. She said she was always haunted by his death and that it was never far from her mind when she had to start making decisions about Jack a Rose. Then there was the finances.

“I am a supervisor at a carwash here in Chicagoland,” Novak explained. “I've made $61,000 so far this year and my take home pay has been about $48,000. No, I really didn't have the money to do this. I've been through hard times financially before. I had to do it.”

She said she used credit cards to make the payments.

Jack a Rose was operated on Apr. 18 and everything went according to plan.

“We removed all the cartilage of his joint and put it back in perfect alignment with screws and wiring and a plate and let bone heal to bone so it becomes one single unit of bone that's very functionable,” Hogan explained. “It no longer bends but horses who have had this surgery can get around fine.”

Jack a Rose in the paddock | Dr. Patricia Hogan

Hogan said that she and her entire team rallied around the horse.

“This was a completely heart-warming story,” Hogan said. “We do this surgery for horses, but it's always for ones that are worth a ton of money. To do one for a horse who is a 5-year-old gelding was just amazing. Our whole crew, we were heavily invested in this horse. He's a wonderful horse. Just an amazing animal. To know how much these people cared about him was special. It was very satisfying to have been able to do a good job for them. Horse racing get bashed so much. I like to get these stories out there to educate people and show them there are plenty of people out there who really love their horses.”

Unable to have a second career, Jack a Rose is among the newest arrivals at Old Friends. Novak is hoping to visit him in January.

“I love animals,” she said. “If I could save every horse I would.”

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West Virginia Trims Dates For ’24, Exact Schedules Hinge On Outcome of HISA Legality

Both Charles Town Races and Mountaineer Park got approval Wednesday from the West Virginia Racing Commission (WVRC) to reduce live racing dates in 2024 compared to recent seasons.

The Horsemen's Benevolent and Protective Association (HBPA) chapters at both tracks supported the diminished schedules based on available purse funds and projected horse populations.

Right now the placeholders are 158 dates for Charles Town and 121 for Mountaineer.

But the exact number of programs will ultimately be contingent on the outcome of several overlapping federal lawsuits that have to do with the legality of the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act (HISA).

In July of 2022, the states of West Virginia and Louisiana won a preliminary injunction that has kept the HISA rules from being implemented in those two states until their lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of HISA gets decided in full.

Then in September of 2023, the judge handling that case ordered it to be “administratively terminated” until the United States Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals made a ruling in a separate (but related) suit in which the National HBPA is also alleging that HISA is unconstitutional.

Oral arguments in the HBPA vs. HISA case were heard Oct. 4 but no Fifth Circuit decision has been issued yet.

WVRC executive director Joe Moore explained during the Dec. 13 meeting that if HISA were to be deemed legal nationwide and/or the court's injunction barring implementation in West Virginia got lifted, both tracks would need to recalculate how much purse money was available and how many racing dates those funds could cover.

That's because Charles Town and Mountaineer would be subject to HISA assessments for safety oversight and drug testing services that they currently don't pay because of the injunction that grants them an exception.

According to HISA's 2024 budget, West Virginia's assessment for next year is $4,448,269 (Charles Town $3,281,367; Mountaineer $1,166,902).

Moore said that “if HISA were to become effective in West Virginia, I suspect Charles Town and the horsemen would consider reducing their race days by a number to ensure that there were purse monies available after the [HISA] assessments were calculated for them.”

Charles Town's director of racing, Charlie McIntosh, concurred.

“If HISA were to come back into effect, we'd have to sit down and evaluate” funding options, McIntosh said.

Mountaineer gate | Coady Photography

No representative from Mountaineer spoke on the track's behalf during the meeting.

The two tracks handled their dates reduction requests differently. Charles Town asked for and received 158 dates but left the door open to come back to the commission for a further reduction request if necessary.

Mountaineer took the opposite approach, asking for and receiving the commission's approval for two dates contingencies so the track wouldn't have to come back a second time to request another trim if HISA gets legalized in the state.

So the WVRC approved 121 dates for Mountaineer, with Moore explaining that “if feasible and [if West Virginia continues to] remain exempt from HISA, their number of live race days would increase to 128.”

Moore said Mountaineer's season would run Apr. 28-Dec. 4 under the first contingency, with the meet extending through Dec. 11 if the second plan got utilized.

Charles Town's 2024 schedule, according to the track's website, will consist of four- and three-date weeks nearly year-round, with breaks Aug. 25-Sept. 11 and Dec. 15-31.

Charles Town's 158 dates for 2024 continues a downward trend. The track was awarded 164 dates in 2023 and 179 in 2022.

Unless Mountaineer ends up running the bumped-up 128 dates, its 121-date allotment also represents a decrease, from 124 dates in 2023 and 130 dates in 2022.

(All dates cited above are based on dates as originally assigned by the commission, and do not reflect any in-season program losses that might have occurred because of weather cancellations.)

Even in years when the costs of HISA assessments have not been in play, the awarding of race dates in West Virginia has been a somewhat confusing several-step process. A state statute requires Charles Town to apply for 220 programs every year, and Mountaineer is required to apply for 210 dates. But those quotas haven't been reached for quite some time.

What has ended up happening in recent seasons is that after the initial approvals of those mandated 220 and 210 dates every November by the WVRC, both venues have subsequently come back before the commission to ask for reductions that reflect what each track and its HBPA representatives think is a workable schedule.

The dates reduction votes were unanimous Dec. 13, with WVRC chairman Ken Lowe Jr. and commissioner J.B. Akers voting in the affirmative, while commissioner Tony Figaretti was listed as being absent from the meeting because of a travel conflict.

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Wanamaker’s December Sale Catalogue Released

The 2023 Wanamaker's December Sale catalogue is now available online with bidding open at 8:00 a.m. EST on Thursday, Dec. 21. The first listing completes that day at 5:00 p.m. EST and subsequent listings close in three-minute increments, the company said in a release Wednesday.

With weanlings, yearlings, horses of racing age, open broodmares and broodmares in-foal all catalogued this month, top first-crop stallions of 2023 will also be represented. Yearlings by Mitole, Maximus Mischief and Vino Rosso are included.

Highlights of the catalogue:

A yearling filly by Mitole (Hip 6). Mitole is the leading first-crop sire by earnings and co-leader by winners.
A yearling filly by Vino Rosso (Hip 3), out of SW Awesome Alexandra.
A yearling filly by Maximus Mischief comes from the family of MGSW Candy Man Rocket (Hip 4).

In-person inspections may be scheduled by contacting sellers with the information provided in the catalogue.

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