This already exists in the USEF drug and medication rules. There are four categories of drug and medication violations in the USEF “penalty guidlines” with differing severity of punishments recommended, depending on the category of drug found in the horse.
https://www.usef.org/forms-pubs/GZu5HCSAirw/drugs--medications-penalty-guidelines
Is that a place where the new yellow card rules could be useful? Anybody who is uncooperative or abusive during the drug testing process could get a yellow card, which might make people behave a bit better once word goes around about it.
In my experience, the urine sample is way, way, way secondary to the blood sample.
The vet usually pulls the blood right away, and then the tech or assistant waits around to get a urine sample. But if the horse does not cooperate, or the tech just gets tired of waiting, they will leave without getting urine.
Many years ago, I had a tech waiting around to get a urine sample on a pony. But she insisted on waiting inside the stall with him. I told her that he would not want to pee while she was inside the stall, because I knew the pony well, and I was sure he would be too shy for that. I told her she would have better luck waiting right outside the stall door until he got started.
I’m not sure if she thought I was trying to pull a fast one on her or what. But after she sat in that stall for about two hours with him, she finally gave up and left. And about two seconds after she went around the corner, sure enough, the pony peed like a racehorse. It was kind of hilarious in a way.
The ubiquitous sight of sharps container boxes on barns at shows leaves me with this question - why have we visually surrendered to the fact that needles are in such high use that we accept them? Who legitimately needs to be needling their horses? What conditions require such treatments? It’s not as if there are competitions full of diabetic horses.
What about banning needle possession as in FEI rules? If a horse requires an injection it would need to be registered and signed off on by the show vet.
The dirty secret of drugging acceptance has a big flag - yellow plastic boxes everywhere.
Excellent article. Very refreshing.
We’ve had threads here that horses are injected frequently with Legend or Adequan as part of routine maintenance at shows. It was widely accepted as routine and part of good horse care. Read the Selevit thread. I personally felt that the frequency of injections to keep a showing horse “comfortable” was eye opening, but it is indeed part of normal behavior for many.
Of course. It might be useful to have those injections which are totally legitimate be witnessed by a show vet. Needles handed out at time of injection perhaps. I understand the vet time involved but it would seem like a step in the right direction and would seen as a minor PITA to organize but with a large visual of working towards a cleaner sport.
There are a lot of shows where the show vet is just on call, not on the property all the time.
In the past I have seen USEF hand down penalties for failure to comply with a show official. The rule is already in place for abusing staff so you can skip the yellow card and go right to rules violations
As I see it, there are two paths in this road.
#1- Wait for the organizations to deal with it. To come up with rules, sanctions, ways & wherefores, education, etc.
#2- Don’t wait for the organizations to deal with it. Start a grassroots campaign from the bottom up, as it were. Talk about it. Find ways to educate through casual explanations. Produce written/illustrated material, online and on paper, and share it. Those who understand the issues, especially owners and riders who understand the issues, can start spreading knowledge and standing behind owners and riders who want to ask questions, but are feeling a bit intimidated about doing so.
Considering both –
What’s the track record on #1? It might be more effective, widespread and immediate – once it gets underway. Whenever that is.
#2 may not have been done before – don’t know – but motivated show participants could start on their own, could find and support each other, and at least begin to get more knowledge into the system.
Owners who do understand the issues and know how to monitor their trainer’s actions, and how to find the best trainers, can be some of the most effective at this. Simply because peer-to-peer is often felt to be more credible than top-down, if it is done in a supportive way.
The more #2 begins to get even a bit of traction, the more #1 is inclined to start moving in the right direction. Until #1 gets there, #2 can start helping at least some horses wherever it can. Just a thought.
I’d say the FEI vet delegate is in a different category than the show vet.
S/he would not be providing services for payment directly to the competitors.
Part of the education should include why it is bad. The trainer may excuse it airly, it doesn’t really hurt the horse, plenty of horses are doing this and are fine. Of course an owner/student believes them, they are the chosen authority.
The material should contradict the trainer’s dismissals. Help owners with questions to ask. Even put in a note that “some practioners of this undesirable practice excuse it with ‘__’, but beware of those excuses”. So that owners can more easily relate the education to their own situation.
Without presenting information in the right way, it won’t resonate with the owners. Trainers are already prepared to explain things away. They’ve done it for years.
There has to be a method that puts what trainers say in a new light that owners can realize matches the situation that they find themselves in.
What does it say “and/or the owner” instead of just “and the owner”?
Let’s say an owner really truly didn’t know. Haul them up before a disciplinary committee – or even just send them a scary certified letter telling them of the potential dire consequences resulting from an investigation – and let the owner then turn on the trainer.
The owner can push back on the organization as firmly as they wish. But if at the end of it, it’s substantiated that yes the abuse happened (whatever it was, drugs, behavior, etc.), let them then turn their fury on the trainer who put the owner in this awful position.
The organization needs to be prepared to push back on owners, telling them “If you didn’t know, it doesn’t matter, you are still accountable for your horse. You need to hold your trainer accountable to you, just as we are holding your trainer accountable to the organization.”
Let the trainer have the pushback coming from two directions, both crucial to their careers – the overseeing organization and their owner(s).
Some trainers – even some BNT’s – may even end up leaving horse showing and find other careers, if this is really the only way they can make it in horse showing. That has happened in other disciplines that finally cracked down.
This needs some thought. “Everyone knows so-and-so does it, but no one can catch them at it.”
Several years ago there was even a series of COTH articles about a training program with apparently widespread notoriety on these issues. The organization tried to go after them. The trainer partner-duo prevailed. Per the reporting, anyway.
What individuals can do when they know ‘enough’, even if not everything, how an investigation can be initiated if rumors can be validated – those are deep waters, but if there is a way to explain to the individuals, there might be a way forward to really root out the most intrinsic problems.
I’d interpret it to mean that any of the people listed are equally in the soup, whether they are doing the actual dosing or not.
The Enhancement of Penalty was a new rule added on to the possible penalties to cover people who knowingly or otherwise hired dirty trainers.
This is huge.
There have been COTH threads about the poor behavior at shows, and the rules-breaking in warm-up rings by BNTs, but no one will intervene because the BNT brought maybe 20% of the entries.
Trainers absolutely know the power they have – or don’t have – based on the size of their contingent at that show.
Shows that are highly dependent on the patronage of certain trainers and their strings understandably have a hard time speaking up to those trainers. The consequences could be devastating to the show if the trainer withdraws their support.
Honestly, - hypothetically - if stopping abusive trainers has enough of an impact on those trainers to have an impact on the shows they attend, there is going to be a sort of reset period in showing to allow other, cleaner actors, to step forward and take their place. The patience to work through the change, and the financial resilience to weather it, will be part of the change.
If the abuse is widespread enough, that is. If most trainers are on the good side of the problem, maybe it won’t be as hard for the show managers.
So would video.
Cameras are ubiquitous in everyday life now. They are honestly a cheap, fast, reliable way to catch people out at horse shows, just as they do in so many other settings.
Knowing there are cameras everywhere might be one way to put the breaks on some abuses of that kind. Let there be no place to longe a horse into exhaustion that won’t be seen on video.
With most surveillance cameras, they are only reviewed if there is a reason. A complaint or an investigation.
For a situation like this where - by the design of the bad actor - there are unlikely to be witnesses, maybe certain cameras can be reviewed daily by a designated person. Just for the night hours, or times no one is normally there. I used to do that for a particular purpose. The video can be put on speed playback and it only take a few minutes to look at several hours of what should be empty space, just to see if anything catches the eye. As a long-term longeing session certainly would.
I owned a horse of the same mindset for several years (now passed over the rainbow bridge). On horse show weekends he saved peeing for in the trailer. I spent a lot of time trying to teach him to pee on command, as my friend successfully trained her horse to do, and never made much headway.
Apparently my horse had a privacy thing – I found two low-key, relaxed personality people who could take him out of sight of everyone & everything at the horse show, and get him to pee. But no one with an agenda (pee! now! we’re burning daylight!) could be there or it didn’t happen.
The one time he was randomly picked for a drug test, he never peed and they just gave up. They could have pulled blood but I think someone made a scientific observation that he was very unlikely to be drugged with anything. He wasn’t. Just his daily contrarian personality.
Unfortunately with a racehorse, you can’t really leave the test barn area. 
There is an area outside normally where you can walk them if they are being “difficult” but in January or February in Eastern Ontario, it’s not something you really want to do. The cold and wind would take your breath away, not to mention freeze the bath water off your hot horse.
I remember a woman I showed with on the local western circuit who had her horse pulled for a test at an AQHA show. She told them there was no way he was going to pee in that test stall, but if she put him in the trailer, he’d go right away. After waiting for over an hour they decided to try her suggestion, they got their sample in minutes. Another shy boy.
Was that at a recognized USEF horse show? That does not sound at all like the usual procedure.
Particularly since his demeanor would be completely unrelated to any painkillers he might have on board.
Not accusing you of anything, obviously. Just stating a fact regarding the idea of calling off a drug test for that reason.
You think it’s extreme? When are ammy’s going to open their eyes and realize their horses are almost falling down. I watched multiple last year in top A/O classes that couldn’t even pick their feet up, one completely didn’t and plowed right through the jump. It’s not harsh, it’s the honest truth.
I don’t entirely disagree, but they are selected by show management, also I couldn’t swear it wasn’t the treating vet which would be the equivalent of the show vet (especially since the vet delegate needs to be a bit more front and center during competition hours which would overlap with testing)
By submitting your email, you agree to our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. You may also receive promotional emails from The Chronicle of the Horse. You can opt out at any time.
For Customers
Company
Terms of Use
