And for some real trivia…who can name the horse who was Damascus’ rabbit?
It just wasn’t that great of a race and these blocking tactics aren’t anything new, unfortunately.
Here’s the better one, just listen to the crowds! 
Trivia answer:
“Damascus continued his sensational run by beating older horses in the Aqueduct Handicap carrying actual top weight, and then destroyed Buckpasser and Dr. Fager, who was cooked by Damascus’ rabbit Hedevar and to a lesser extent by Buckpasser’s rabbit Great Power, in the Woodward, winning by 10 lengths.” (Blood Horse)
Yep. All the time. I own the rabbit for Tabasco Cat, Commanche Trail (yes, name misspelled).
I also looked up a bunch of other TC races and I could identify other rabbits: long odds, doesn’t belong in the race, in top 2 or 3 for the 1st half of the race before dropping back to the end of the line. They are easy to identify when you look.
But DWL made an art form of winning with help from a rabbit. He even ran a rabbit in the Belmont; but due to a slow start, the horse never was able to do his job.
All part of the sport! Plus he faded half way around…
I know it’s commonly done - so even at this level all it gets is a little glance of side eye?
The man on the street questions it, the racing authorities don’t. Not yet anyway.
I don’t know if I would even call it a questionable tactic. It’s a tactic, period. It’s a race, after all. If we didn’t want racing tactics to come into play, we would have the horses run entirely in their own lanes, or just run timed heats with the best time winning. Or limit owners and trainers to one entry per race. That wouldn’t stop the problem, but it would lead to some interesting behind the shed row conversations between trainers as they negotiated sending our rabbits for each other’s horses or colluding to box in a favorite.
If sending out a second horse from the same stable to run interference or keeping a good contender like Audible in the barn was the way to ensure a good but not great horse was the Triple Crown winner, there wouldn’t have been a 37 year stretch without one.
Oh brother. Anyone with a working pair of eye could see what was going on in the early stages of that race. Last I checked, it’s called strategy. Are rabbits suddenly a new controversial thing now??
Why should horses be the only racers to forego pacemakers ?
No kidding.
Everyone can get their panties in a wad, but the fact of the matter is that the horses whose connections are claiming foul were well beaten. If they had any chance to begin with, they wouldn’t have finished up the track. Vino Rosso finished closest, and he never once looked like he could have made up the lengths between him and Justify, with or without a block.
The bigger concern is Florent Geroux blatantly not riding to win; although I doubt anything will come of it.
Would the West’s really have sacrificed Restoring Hope to help Justify win? I find that part odd.
It’s not like Winstar and China Horse Club don’t have loads of other horses they could have entered to do the same job.
Technically, i suppose you could make the case that it is against the rules of racing, in that the horse isn’t run on his merits. But Restoring Hope did finish 5th, so it’s not like Geroux stopped riding after he did his job for Justify.
And as for Repole complaining, wasn’t his plan to have Noble Indy push Justify early so Vino Rosso could close for the win?
A rabbit sets a blazing fast pace for a closer, and is usually owned by the same owner he is setting up the pace for, not a different owner. Very few owners would let their G1 horse be used like that. Restoring Hope was not a “rabbit.” You don’t send a stablemate to go up to the lead with your Triple Crown hopeful. Nor did he “block” any other horse, any more than any horse lying 2nd just to the outside of the pace “blocks” another horse. If you are stupid enough to get “blocked” in a 1.5 mile race with 10 horses, you don’t belong race riding.
What job? It’s way way way more likely that sending a stablemate to sit on the leader will make the leader go faster and waste energy. They wanted Justify to relax and just cruise, and having another horse press him is the antithesis to what was planned. I don’t see how people can accuse Baffert of using one horse to “block” another. If you’ve ever sat on a race horse you know how highly competitive they are and how difficult it can be to get them to relax and rate. You’d NEVER compromise your Belmont chances by sending a stablemate to sit off your pace setter.
This is kind of my sentiment; if the horses had any legitimate chance of finishing well, they would have/could have overcome one extra horse in their path for the first half of the race.
If you can’t get around one horse to get to the leader, you never had a shot to begin with.
However, Florent Geroux was water skiing pretty dramatically once his horse got within striking distance of Justify. It would be a valid argument that he didn’t want to get in a pace duel with Justify and use up his horse prematurely, but even so, that still was a suspiciously hard check… I understand why that would upset Gary West and the bettors, as well as cause skepticism. But Vino Rosso, Noble Indy, Bravazo… those horses’ outcomes weren’t going to be any different with or without Restoring Hope.
I think that’s why Gary West was so dumbfounded by the ride. And Restoring Hope finished 8th and waaaay up the track, not 5th. IMO, Geroux did stop riding… but it may have not been for nefarious reasons, Restoring Hope was probably just used up.
Geroux’s ride was questionable, but certainly not careless or dangerous. The owners of the other horses are being melodramatic. If Restoring Hope wasn’t a stablemate to Justify, we wouldn’t be talking about any of this.
I can’t remember the year, but sometime in the 50s, I remember Rex Ellsworth/Misch Tenney sent out Olden Times (a sprinter/miler) in the San Juan Capistrano (then 1.75 mi.) as a rabbit for one of his other horses. Shoemaker was on Olden Times, whom he said was never beaten out of the gate. Shoemaker opened up 24 lengths on the field and hung on to win by a nose. In that case, the “rabbit” pulled an upset.
