2023 Horse Racing
- Thread starter phillydad
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So close
cliftonparksufan
Iggy Award Czar/Co 2020-21 Iggy Award Winner PPG
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He ran a good race but no reason anyone should have bet him to win,and the odds showed it. Nice double, triple and super for anyone who bet it.
djcon57
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Only thing you could possibly point to is he was semi close to Forte in the Florida Derby...but yeah I didnt see anyone come from behind for 4 days, so I wasnt about to bet him
cliftonparksufan
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IthacaBarrel
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Derma sotakake breaks he wins, IMO completely missed break. Was hoping two Phil’s would win.
kirbivore
2019 Cali Award (Passing Yards)
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For some reason these mug shot photos of the sad horse make me laugh
NineOneSeven
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So 7 horses died huh? Great sport.
cliftonparksufan
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The biggest problem is that there is no national governance of the sport. Until then, there is no urgency for shady trainers to self-police the sport. It might be the Sport of Kings but it's definitely not the sport of honesty.
The biggest issue is the amount at stake. Not only the purses but also the ability to wager on races that your horses are participating in.
That said, it's extremely popular. The amount bet continues to increase and more people are becoming owners through syndicates and microshares.
Horse racing will never go away, like greyhound racing. There is too much history and money. I would think most people want the sport cleaned up. Unfortunately, it's not the ones in charge.
US Horse Racing 2021 Handle Surpasses $12B, Highest in 12 Years
The increase in bets on horse racing came as the number of race days and total races increased dramatically from 2020
www.casino.org
I think the stats show that horses in racing die at a higher rate (2x) than avg horses kept as pets.. Not surprising because they are vastly more active than the avg pet horse on a daily basis..
But tell me this how many horse died as work horse or ranch horses or in the wild over the yrs?
Look up the stats on how many dairy cows die every yr in the first yr..
IthacaBarrel
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The sport needs to be cleaned up for sure and has for years and has to make changes for the future as many sports do and have done.. Thoroughbred horses are a pretty fragile breed, they get hurt and will always be injuries and yes some catastrophic, it has, is and will always be part of the game. It's never going to be 0% fatalities. NEVER. Much like the construction industry will never have zero accidents or fatalities. IMO, there are 3-4 things that contribute to the these breakdowns all which can be controlled and lead to improvement. Random testing at all major tracks will also help. And certain injuries to horses while sometimes seem simple for humans or ever other animals can become life threatening and that is also one of the complecations of the breed.
1. much much stricter penalties for trainers with a serious infraction for using PED's, masking agents and percentage overages of on certain legal medications. Not every overage is a performance enhancing infraction either. Vets, Tracks, jurastictions, etc know what is and what isn't. Better testing and random testing should be done.
2. Stop breeding for just speed and horses with serious confirmation issues as well certain medical issues. Need to be more diligent here for sure but the sales, agents, breeders are where they make the money. Probably should start following the Japanese here and take notes
3. Agreed with clifton, there needs to be a national governance of the sport. It's still too different from state to state. what's allowed ( medications, shoes,even licensing,etc) what isn't varies considerably from state to state, track to track.
4. Much better track maintenance and slowing down the hard dirt surfaces on these bigger racing weekends. Santa Anita had a ton of issues with their dirt track a few years ago, they re- did it, it's softer and slower right now and cut back on injuries considerably. Churchill will need to do the same after this past week. There was something wrong with the dirt surface and everybody knows it. A horse training on this surface 6-7 days a week, leads to soft tissue type stuff and just getting worn down. Should probably all train on a synthetic track to be honest, softer easier on the legs and joints.
5. This past week, I think you had two trainers that should be shown the door in Saffie (chemist) where both horses suffered cardiac type of events ( the odds of two going down like that are 1/10,000,000) and D wayne Lukas, who is infamous for training and running sore horses. Watched his horses at Saratoga too many times. That's 3 horses the other 4 horses, refer to ( 1-4) Not good
All of these factors contribute to where they are at and having the sport under continued criticism on it's biggest week of the year. The sport can't get out of it's own way and the people making all the $ are just fine where it's at regardless of what they say publicly. Those would be the biggest breeders, farms, sales companies and select few trainers and owners. The sport reaps what it sows.
But again, people who don't follow or hate horse racing and hey I get it, not for everyone but there's always going to be risk of injuries and yes always going to be some deaths no matter what is done. Never going to be 100% safe. But the industry can do a lot better and they have to day in day out so that the 3-4 days a year where there is some focus on the industry they can focus more on a horse like Cody's Wish and the story behind that than deaths.
I will also say there are a ton of good people in the industry that do things the right way and take phenomenal care of their horses. There are still a few bad apples and most who follow the industry know exactly who they are.
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Look at the evolution of the running shoe for humans and what it has done running events.
Not sure if some kind shoe could ever be modifed to handle the pounding of large animals.
But if the goal is racing and times dont really matter as much as winning then figure out way to make the animal recover better is probably the hope..
Not sure if some kind shoe could ever be modifed to handle the pounding of large animals.
But if the goal is racing and times dont really matter as much as winning then figure out way to make the animal recover better is probably the hope..
IthacaBarrel
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Yeah all of it. More early injury detection would be great too. Amazed at what of lot of these excercise riders can pick up on while training in the morning too
IthacaBarrel
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Certainly a thought.
Some can, some can't, it all depends on the individual. The equine athlete has followed the path of most modern athletes, Look at the NBA, how many of the best players even play 70 games a year. The best horses are either lightly raced or retired early for breeding purposes and big paydays
What it really comes down to is the horse sound and how quickly they recover from a race, each horse is different. The time between triple crown races use to be standard times between races, not so much.
IthacaBarrel
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yeah doesn't help at the 2 year old sales, they are breezing horses 1/8 of a mile trying to go 9.4, don't know what race in the US that runs 1/8 or a 1/4 of a mile.
lots of quarter horse races out west.. no idea how to handicap them but i see them on TVG all the time.
