Over the limit is over the limit.
I can see why they tried it since when he was tested a few days before the race, it was just trace amounts. It’s a bummer he didn’t clear because Sam and Ron are good people but that’s (sometimes) how it goes when you take a chance like that.
Now that testing is able to detect picograms (a trillionth of a gram) racing needs to follow other sports and enact thresholds. It is ridiculous to continue to penalize for amounts that are far too low to have any effect on a horse’s performance. Especially since horses are now being disqualified for trace amounts of substances whose presence is most likely due to environmental contamination.
It is my understanding that Olympic athletes can compete (and commercial pilots can fly planes) with a banned substance in their blood of less than 200 picograms. And they weigh 1/5th the weight of a horse.
Disqualifying this horse now–after proper practices were followed, the correct withdrawal time was observed, and pre-race testing was done–isn’t fair to anyone involved with the horse. Or to the bettors who bet on different horses now being moved up.
He tested positive before the race. Breeders Cup officials knew about it so hardly a surprise but the horse shouldn’t have been permitted to run if he was already testing positive. They took the chance and unfortunately lost.
Masochistic was over the recommended 60 day limit. Yes, he did test positive before the race. A few days before the race Ron wanted to test him again but couldn’t find a lab that could test to that level in the time left so he decided to chance it.
Ron let the BC officials know about the drug before hand. He never tried to hide anything and he’s not trying to get out of whatever penalties are served up.
Unfortunate that Masochistic did have the DQ. By rules he should have been but in practicality, geeze (I’m with LaurieB that maybe thresholds should be employed)… I hope whatever Ron is served with isn’t huge. He’s always struck me as a straight up trainer (correct me if my assumption is incorrect) and he didn’t duck and hide on this…
Bummer, but he did take a chance starting him. If he continues to take it like he seems to be, doubt it will tarnish his reputation and it might prompt TBTB to define thresholds.
Cheating is cheating aka are you pregnant or not!!!
Hopefully something good will come from this and Graham Motion’s positive last year. Obviously each horse is different but suggested withdrawal times by states seem to be off with at least some drugs.
IDK. There is no therapeutic reason to give this drug, other than to build mass. Even Ellis admits this, “who gave Masochistic’s small size and difficulty maintaining weight as the reasons for the steroid’s administration.” I do 90 days on the farm. But to each his own.
Cheating is deceiving, defrauding, eluding.
As best as I can tell, Ellis made no attempt at any of those. He didn’t hide that he’d use the drug on Masochistic. The drug was administered in advance of the recommended clearance time out of the body but Masochistic appeared to be slow to clear it.
What was found was a very, very small amount but still detectible.
Where’s the “cheating”? Yeah, a rules violation but not seeing “cheating”.
Palm Beach said:
“IDK. There is no therapeutic reason to give this drug, other than to build mass. Even Ellis admits this, “who gave Masochistic’s small size and difficulty maintaining weight as the reasons for the steroid’s administration.” I do 90 days on the farm. But to each his own.”
Fwiw, the CHRB would disagree with you, as would the CA state vet. They allow the theraputic use of steroids, administered by the state vet in a small dose (which was the protocol followed here.) The horse is then put on the vet’s list for 60 days. The rational being that after 60 days any benefit derived from the shot will be gone.
A single steroid dose doesn’t build mass (or muscle) though it does stimulate appetite for a short period of time. It takes repeated doses to change a horse’s (or a human’s) body. Anyone who has ever been given a short course of steroids by their doctor is probably aware of that.
Eating builds muscle mass. Stanozolol was given to get the horse to eat better. Anyone who has been around the track knows that what is written on the paper is not necessarily what and when it was done.
If eating built muscle mass, I would look like Arnold Schwarzenegger.
(I don’t.)
This was not a case of cheating nor defrauding in my eyes. Winstrol is indeed a therapeutic medication; an invaluable one that has gotten a really bad rap thanks to its associated performance enhancing abilities and subsequent abuse by all too many.
Ellis was 100% up front about his use of the drug, 68 days prior to competition!!! There is almost nothing you can give that would enhance performance 68 days later.
Yes, this was one of the “nicest” drug positives I’ve seen. He was very upfront about everything. It sounds like the degree of suspension/fine is discretionary, so I hope they will be easy on him.
I’ve always liked Ellis–I remember him from back in the day when he had Exotic Wood and Twice the Vice racing at the same time. Two very nice fillies!
Palm Beach, are you speaking based on assumptions and guesses or any actual basis in fact that Ellis didn’t follow the rules for the administration of the drug and the withdrawal window?
WMW I know for a fact that many many many drugs are administered and not “billed” on the day they were administered. They write down a different date. It’s called backdating. It’s so funny how many people rush to hold the halo up when someone like Ellis gets caught cheating. The best defense is a good offense, right?
I can’t speak for others, but I don’t feel I’m trying to hold a halo up. It’s just that Ron Ellis has a pretty clean rep, so I’m inclined to take the story at face value.
I don’t think anyone is trying to put a halo on Ellis but your notion that the bill for the shot was backdated seems nonsensical to me.
Ellis was trying to aid the horse in recovering from a race on 8/27. He knew at that point that he wanted the horse to run in the BC Sprint on 11/5–a pretty short window of time in which to use the drug so that it adhered to the state guidelines.
So you’re saying what? That rather than help the horse right away, he waited for a while until it became more likely than the horse would have an overage in the BC, and then gave him the stanozolol?
You seem to be missing the point that one dose even if given forty or fifty days out, cannot magically transform a horse into a BC winner.
Somewhere the owners/trainers of other BC horses who were aided in their BC prep recoveries with meds are sitting back saying “thank god my horse has a normal metabolism” while watching this situation.
