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Grayson-Jockey Club Research Foundation To Hold Second Photo Contest To Celebrate Healthy Horses

Grayson-Jockey Club Research Foundation announced today that it will again be hosting an online photo contest for horse lovers to celebrate their equine companions.

The contest opens February 1, and entries will be accepted through February 28. Horse enthusiasts are encouraged to submit original photos of horses representing all breeds, backgrounds, and disciplines on Grayson's website at grayson-jockeyclub.org/default.asp?section=2&area=PHOTOINFO.

Finalists will be selected by the Grayson team, and the winning photo will be chosen by votes from the public on Grayson's Facebook page. The winner will receive a Grayson “swag bag,” and each finalist will also receive a prize. Selected photos submitted to the contest will be shared on Grayson's social media accounts using the hashtag #ilovehealthyhorses.

“We received an enthusiastic response to last year's photo contest and are looking forward to seeing submissions this year as horse lovers continue to increase awareness of the importance of equine veterinary research and how it leads to healthy horses,” said Jamie Haydon, president of Grayson-Jockey Club Research Foundation.

For the contest's official rules, please visit grayson-jockeyclub.org/default.asp?section=2&area=PHOTORULES&menu=1.

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Can Horses Recognize Themselves In Mirrors?

Many horses like to look at their reflection in shiny surfaces, whether that's a mirror or the window of a trailer or barn. But do they know what they're looking at? The answer is complicated.

An animal's ability to recognize itself in a mirror is a building block of self-awareness; it highlights the cognitive and emotional skills necessary to develop social relationships and engage empathetic behaviors, say Drs. Paolo Baragli, Elisa Demuru, Chiara Scopa and Elisabetta Palagi.

The scientists acclimated four horses to an enclosure that had a mirror—first with the mirror covered, then with it uncovered. They then conducted a test where, in theory, a self-aware animal would perform a sequence of behaviors that leads them to understand that what the mirror is showing them is not another animal, but a reflection.

If the horse were to respond the way other self-aware animals did, they first would look in the mirror inquisitively, wondering who is in the mirror. They then would inspect the actual mirror, look behind the mirror and then test the mirror by making strange faces to see what the reflection does.

The scientists videotaped each of the horse's responses to the mirror the first time it was uncovered. After the initial exposure, the team placed an “X” on each horse's cheek, which the horse would only see when looking in the mirror. The researchers then observed the horses to see if they tried to remove the mark from their cheek, which would indicate that the horse recognized the reflection as his own.

The results from their study did not confirm that a horse could recognize his own reflection. The research team says this may be because the methodology was designed for primates; they also noted that horses simply may not be motivated to remove a mark from their face.

The team is hopeful that more research, possibly with a different testing format, will allow them to determine if a horse recognizes his own reflection.

Sharp To Appeal Kentucky Levamisole Rulings

Days after the publication of stewards' rulings for five levamisole positives, counsel for trainer Joe Sharp says Sharp will be appealing those rulings. Attorney Clark Brewster told the Paulick Report Wednesday that the stewards erred when they wrote a series of decisions declaring the drug to be a Class B substance according to Kentucky's regulations.

“I found it to be extraordinarily unfair and damaging to Joe,” Brewster said. “It's just the intransigence of the stewards not having the courage to recognize the truth and to say, 'Ok, we're sorry about that. Let's get it right.'”

Levamisole is approved by the FDA for use in cattle, sheep, and goats as a dewormer. Brewster said Sharp had been advised to use it as a dewormer for his stable as part of an effort to switch between different anti-parasitic products. He purchased the product over the counter at Tractor Supply.

Managers and trainers have been advised for years not to use the same deworming products too frequently because there is a growing drug resistance among the most common parasites impacting horses. Most veterinarians have discouraged dewormer use according to schedule and instead suggest deworming based on fecal egg counts. The levamisole product used by Sharp came in a powder form and was mixed with water and given orally. Brewster said Sharp preferred this administration because he felt his horses got more complete doses of the drug than from traditional paste dewormers.

Sharp was hit with the levamisole positives in Kentucky around the same time he encountered issues with it in Louisiana, where eight horses were disqualified for post-race positives for the substance between Dec. 1 and Dec. 28, 2019. Sharp was later fined $1,000 for each violation there but was not issued a suspension. Louisiana regulates medication based on guidelines from the Association of Racing Commissioners International, which considers levamisole a Class 2 drug with a B penalty class. ARCI's schematic requires a minimum 15-day suspension and $500 fine for the first violation in the B penalty class.

Kentucky stewards ruled earlier this week to issue a $500 fine for each Kentucky positive and a 30-day suspension to be served concurrent for all five violations. The ruling cited mitigating circumstances, pointing out that he hadn't been notified of the first positive when the subsequent ones occurred.

Kentucky does not follow ARCI's classification guidance for medications and penalties, although there are many similarities between the two.

An important difference to Brewster is the history of changes of levamisole's classification. At one point, the drug was considered a Class A drug (the most serious category) and was later made a Class B. Then, in 2015, commissioners for the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission unanimously agreed to remove levamisole from the drug classification scheme altogether after they detangled the association between levamisole and another drug called aminorex. Aminorex is a stimulant which has the potential for performance enhancement and was the primary substance of concern, they concluded. Initially it had been unclear whether one was a sign that the other had been administered, but Brewster said it's now generally accepted that levamisole can metabolize into aminorex, but not the other way around.

(Read more about the challenges of regulating levamisole and aminorex in this 2018 feature.)

There is a provision in Kentucky's regulations allowing for some flexibility beyond the drug classification chart that's in the states regulations. If a substance comes up in a post-race test that isn't rated on the drug schedule — particularly a new designer drug — the commission can establish an appropriate classification after consulting with ARCI or the Racing Medication and Testing Consortium and call the positive.

But Brewster said this provision shouldn't allow the commission to declassify a drug, only to have stewards call it by its old classification and penalty years later.

“What about Panacur or ivermectin? The horsemen rely on the commission to tell them what they can and can't use. Why couldn't this man rely on what the commission tells him?” said Brewster. “I certainly believe if there's cheating going on or something to gain an advantage or mask pain when a horse shouldn't be running, let's get the classification schedule right, let's take action and police the sport in the most rigorous and fair way possible. This is a situation where somebody's made a terrible mistake and it's really impacted the trainer and they don't have the courage to retreat and do the right thing.”

He also said he notified the stewards of all this at the time of Sharp's hearing in December 2020 and was frustrated to see the ruling state levamisole as a Class B violation anyway. He questioned whether the stewards realized the drug had been delisted five years before.

“This is truly beyond the pale of regulation,” he said. “[The positives were] all over the news. Joe couldn't get stalls at Fair Grounds for a while. People pulled their horses, including one that ran in the Kentucky Derby (Art Collector). He was completely pilloried in the press, all on the basis that the stewards just didn't read the list.”

If the commission wanted to add levamisole back onto the drug classification schedule, Brewster believes the regulatory body should have gone through the usual rule-making process to do so.

“If that's the case, wouldn't we have an opportunity to say why it shouldn't be listed?” he said. “Wouldn't it be listed at a public hearing in the same fashion where it was delisted? But they just quietly wouldn't respond.”

The Kentucky Horse Racing Commission declined comment on Brewster's arguments, citing a policy of not commenting on active cases.

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How It Works: A Detailed Look At How Eclipse Award Winners Are Chosen

This is the first piece in an occasional series designed to address reader questions about the way things in racing work – regulatory and business processes, technology, and more. Today, we're kicking off the series with an explanation of the voting process for the Eclipse Awards.

The process for choosing Eclipse Award finalists and winners varies slightly between award types. The winners of awards given to horses, trainers, jockeys, owners, and breeders are selected by a group of voters from three sources: the National Thoroughbred Racing Association, Daily Racing Form, and National Turf Writers and Broadcasters (NTWAB). NTRA voters include officials at NTRA member racetracks and field personnel at Equibase, racing's official database. Daily Racing Form's bloc includes a broad block of editorial staff in various positions, allocated at the company's discretion.

Only full members of NTWAB are granted a vote. NTWAB's membership is comprised of active writers or broadcasters working for recognized trade publications or covering racing for mainstream outlets. Members are granted admission after an examination of their credentials, which must include paid journalistic work, by the NTWAB board and a vote by existing membership.

In mid-December, all members of the voting body are mailed packets of past performances grouped by category. Voters are not limited to the horses or humans whose names appear in this past performance packet, but the packet is compiled based on the anticipated leaders in each equine group. Humans are listed under their category in various ways, showing leaders by wins, by earnings, and by graded winners. Complicating matters in the owner and breeder categories is the popularity of partnerships in modern racing. Earnings and wins are shown by entity according to the way they appear in the racing program, not per individual. For example, Head of Plains Partners often owns percentages of several active horses, rather than 100% of one horse. Because data gatherers don't know the financial arrangements of each partnership, they can't separate out the earnings Head of Plains gathered across multiple group ownership shares.

Voters may vote only for an individual person or racing stable on their ballot (i.e., voting for Authentic's ownership means voting for MyRacehorse, Starlight Racing, Madaket Stables, or Spendthrift, but not all four).

Voters are also advised to keep an eye on the graded stakes races through the end of the year, as a few still take place after the mailing of the voting packets.

Horses under consideration for an Eclipse Award must have made at least one start in the United States or Canada in the relevant year. Beyond this, members are not given specific instructions as to how they may select horses or weigh past performance information. Voters can and do ascribe their own meaning to grades of races, quality of effort, quality of fields, human connections, and more. Voters can also consider overseas races however they choose; typically overseas victories by American-based horses are given more weight than success of foreign runners overseas who made one American start.

It is generally understood that selected horses must align with the demographic group they're named in (i.e., if you vote for a mare in the older male turf category, you can expect a call or email asking if it was a mistake). Voters with particularly unconventional choices (such as a horse who primarily ran on dirt in a turf category) may be asked to justify their choices. Voting members are not provided with licensure information or horses' drug violation histories beyond disqualifications that may be evident in a past performance record. The expectation is that voters should be engaged enough to be familiar with the year's happenings or do independent research before voting.

Voters may choose to abstain voting in a particular category for any reason they choose. They may not choose the winner in the category and abstain from voting in the remaining two slots. Voters are expected to abstain in situations where they may have a unique personal interest, such as an ownership share in a horse who may be a viable candidate in a category.

Voters are then asked to make three choices for each category. The voter's top choice counts as their vote for the “winner” of the category. Voters rank their choices first-second-third. A first-place vote is ascribed 10 points by voting organizers, a second-place vote five points, and a third-place vote one point. The award winner is the one who received the most “winner” votes, while the three finalists announced ahead of the year's Eclipse Award ceremony are those with the greatest number of points.

Strangely, this means that a horse or person could garner a handful of “winner” votes but not become a finalist if a rival has a high number of second or third choice votes. In 2019, for example, Irad Ortiz Jr. was the clear winner in the Jockey category with 205 winner votes. He was a finalist in the category alongside Javier Castellano and Jose Ortiz. When complete results were announced however, it was clear that Jose only had one voter name him as a “winner” of the category, while Flavien Prat got five votes as “winner,” and Joel Rosario and Mike Smith got three each. Jose Ortiz must have had many more voters put him second or third on their ballots, which is how he was named a finalist and Prat, Rosario, and Smith were not.

After the results are announced, organizers send out a tally showing which candidates got “winner” votes and how many “winner” votes they got. This tally typically doesn't indicate how many points a candidate got as a second or third place holder on voters' ballots.

The finalists are announced in alphabetical order for each category, and do not reflect the vote totals, which aren't released until after the award ceremony. Voters do not receive the final results until the day of the ceremony.

The Horseplayer of the Year Eclipse is given to the winner of the National Horseplayers Championship. Voters do not weigh in on this category.

Media Eclipse Awards are decided differently. Media members may submit two entries in each of the media categories – there are two for writing, two for television, one photography, and one multimedia. Writers may also submit a single multi-part series in a category. Media submit their entries for the year in mid-November. For media, the relevant “year” runs from November to November, the idea being that the Breeders' Cup marks the bookend of the racing season.

Judging panels of three experts judge the entries in each media category. Judges work on a volunteer basis and are often retired or semi-retired professionals with experience in the category, or active professionals who do not currently work primarily in racing journalism. Entrants do not know the identity of the judging panel until after the judging is complete, and are asked to remove identifying information from the text of their entry to keep things as objective as possible.

Media Award winners are notified and announced between late December to early January.

Special Eclipse Awards and Eclipse Awards of Merit are chosen by a small committee of representatives from each of the three voting blocs. The Special Award is typically given in recognition of outstanding achievement or service to the industry. It is not given out every year, but rather when the committee feels strongly that one candidate embodies the spirit of the award. The Award of Merit is a recognition of lifetime achievement and is also not given every year. Finalists for these awards are not revealed publicly but winners are announced in advance.

The awards are typically presented at a formal ceremony in late January, but due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it will take place virtually on Jan. 28 and will be streamed across multiple platforms.

Want to know how something in racing works? Email us using the Ask Ray button in the red bar at the top of this page.

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