From Tim Sullivan on SignOnSanDiego.com

May 6, 2008

The suitability of dirt tracks scratches only the surface. To find the root cause of Eight Belles' Kentucky Derby death, you should start in the breeding shed and look at the ledgers and retrace a path fraught with peril at every turn.

The abrupt end of the filly's life Saturday at Churchill Downs could be attributable to something as simple as a bad step, but racing's risks are numerous, systemic and complex.

“Every year it becomes tougher and tougher to justify what we're seeing out there on these race tracks,” Del Mar President Joe Harper said yesterday. “I wish it were just the surface. That's something that management can deal with.

“But the economics of this industry are not always beneficial to the health of the horse, and getting everyone to recognize the dire circumstances that could happen if we don't deal with this problem is not always easy.”

Harper spent $9 million to install a Polytrack surface at Del Mar, and says he would gladly have spent $90 million to enhance the track's safety. Yet many of the problems he perceives are beyond the purview of track operators: speed-based breeding that devalues durability; overtraining and overracing; drugs that mask problems instead of curing them; pre-existing injuries that get glossed over; trainers short on cash and/or qualifications.

Most of these factors fall under the general heading of Greed. All of them are worth studying if racing is to reduce its incidence of made-for-TV tragedy. Though some equine experts reflexively shrink from this sort of scrutiny, Joe Harper welcomes it with the zeal of a reformer who really, truly puts horses first.
“Most people run from those things and hope it goes away,” Harper said. “And it's something that isn't going away. ... (But) It takes some national publicity to rekindle the fire.”

If the horsemen's hierarchy is not careful, that fire could easily burn out of control. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals has seized upon Eight Belles' demise to demand that the industry abandon dirt tracks in favor of synthetic surfaces, refrain from the racing of young horses, permanently ban the use of whips, and suspend Eight Belles' jockey Gabriel Saez, trainer Larry Jones and owner Richard Porter.

Say what you will about PETA's pragmatism (little) or its due process (less), but racing needs to realize that it can't afford arrogance on animal rights issues. If it does not address its safety problems and search for the common thread in the fatal injuries that have recently befallen high-profile races like the Preakness and the Breeders' Cup, it invites the intrusion of Congress.

For starters, the Triple Crown schedule should be spread out so that the top 3-year-olds are not compelled to run as many as three races in a span of five weeks. Next, owners and trainers should face progressively steep penalties for entering infirm horses or abusing medication. Should it spur meaningful change in an inadequately regulated industry, Eight Belles' death might not prove to be pointless.

“This tragic event is sure setting off a public frenzy,” said Dr. Sue Stover, the UC Davis professor who directs the J.D. Wheat Veterinary Orthopedic Research Laboratory. “I am alarmed as well as devastated by the loss of a horse. (But) The racing community is already concerned. For them, horses are part of the family.”

Like Harper, Stover emphasizes that racing's risks are “multifactorial,” from track surface to horseshoe design. Both Harper and Stover are reluctant to mandate specific changes, but the early results from synthetic tracks suggest that's a good place to start.

“For us, it was certainly worth every penny to put that (Polytrack) in,” Harper said. “And we'll keep on working on it to make it as safe as we can. But it's not Lourdes. It doesn't cure anything. It just forgives some things.”

Rick Arthur, equine medical director for the California Horse Racing Board, credits synthetic surfaces for a 30-40 percent decline in catastrophic injuries since 2004. If it has also resulted in slower times and harder handicapping, that's a trade-off Harper will happily make.

“I'm very optimistic about synthetic tracks,” Stover said. “ ... (But) There are dirt tracks that can be managed well. A synthetic track that works at one site, say Southern California, may not work in New York (because of climate differences). To condemn dirt tracks altogether would be a mistake.”

So long as owners and trainers are paid for performance rather than compassion, reconciling the two types of racing will be as difficult as reaching consensus on the designated hitter. None of the five top finishers in the Derby had ever run a race on a synthetic track. The winners of two prominent prep races run on Polytrack – Adriano and Monba – were the final finishers in the Derby's field of 20.

“If you breed for speed, you're not always breeding for stamina,” Harper said. “That's part of the problem. But speed is not necessarily a horse's best friend. The horses that were taken out of Del Mar and went East, I don't think any of them are running any more.”

Neither is Barbaro, the 2006 Derby winner. Neither is George Washington, the two-time European champion euthanized at last year's Breeders' Cup at Monmouth Park. Neither is Pine Island, a casualty of the 2006 Breeders' Cup at Churchill Downs.

Horsemen, take the hint.