Even the smallest tier track in the Mid Atlantic, Charles Town has been doing that for decades. I guess I assumed it was universal.
2 Likes
Doesn’t appear to be cup holes.
"Santa Anita’s one mile main track, which has been closed to training for the past two days, has been deemed “100 percent ready,” by Dr. Mick Peterson, director of the University of Kentucky’s Agricultural Equine Programs. Peterson has been evaluating soil samples from Santa Anita on a monthly basis.
In addition to soil samples and a thorough examination of the track’s cushion, pad and base, which was conducted by Peterson and Santa Anita Track Superintendent Andy LaRocco, Peterson employed ground-penetrating radar to ensure uniform consistency throughout the one mile oval.
“The ground penetrating radar verified all of the materials, silt, clay and sand, as well as moisture content, are consistent everywhere on this track,” said Peterson on Wednesday afternoon. "This testing ensures all components, the five-inch cushion, pad and base, are consistent and in good order.
“Andy (LaRocco) has inspected the entire oval and has made sure that by pulling the soil (cushion) off and reapplying it, this surface is in fact one hundred percent consistent and ready for training and racing.”
Hmmmm, ok.
based on the article & what I’ve read elsewhere, while pre race inspections are done, it’s seemed like it is NOT done for every single horse racing.
If this is incorrect, could you provide links with current facts.
1 Like
Links no. Current facts, yes.
A sample of the tracks we’ve raced at over the last 5 years: Keeneland, Churchill, Arlington, Santa Anita, Del Mar, Monmouth, Indiana, Ellis Park, Kentucky Downs, Tampa Bay Downs. The vet always comes by in the morning for the pre-race inspection. Of course I’ve mostly only seen this happen to my own horses. But it defies belief that my horses are the being examined and no one else’s are. Fwiw, the horses have been entered in everything from stakes races to claiming races, and the vets still show up every time.
4 Likes
Here’s an update from today’s LAT.
https://www.latimes.com/sports/more/la-sp-santa-anita-horse-deaths-20190306-story.html
My jockey friend did tell me that there are always pre-race vet checks at Santa Anita for all the horses racing. There is another thread on this issue over on Off Topic I think.
On the 'two-year-old" issue: Ok, make that three-year-olds too. That is my likely, uninformed opinion. We didn’t start our horses under saddle until they were three. But, thanks for the statistic.
@mommy peanut - there are also state vets watching the horses warm up on the track prior to the race and they have the authority to scratch any horse that they feel is unsound. The jocks can also take off a horse if they don’t like the way it is traveling during the warm up.
Los Alamitos is hosting end of week/weekend night racing for Quarter Horses and Thoroughbreds. They do this year-round. So a track that is located right up the street from Santa Anita, has had the same amount of rains and weather conditions,…has not had anywhere near as bad of issues that we have seen at SA these last 2 months. There is something to be said for that. Dig up the entire surface at SA and replace it if they really want to eliminate the track being the problem.
All these “soil samples” and evaluating the dirt that is on the track is not going to fix this. I think SA has a much bigger issue at hand and the fact that a track in the same vicinity conducting races weekly, has not had nearly this much of an issue.
Will be interesting to see if Moore comes back after today and says “all is well”. I would still say dig up the track and eliminate it entirely as a factor.
1 Like
Trainers are not a monolithic group. They are 100+ individual small business people (and some not so small) which are situated out of the same racing “mall” if you will. They have different clients, financial and other pressures, horses and philosophies. I personally wouldn’t extrapolate across the board like that.
Secondly if I remember correctly, what Santa Anita did was close the track on virtually no notice when horsemen had already made up set lists for that day. These are athletes and you can’t just leave them in the barn. It was a really high handed tone deaf response from management.
Caveat–I haven’t raced out of Santa Anita since last year and other than a couple of visits, I’m kind of out of touch. But what I do know is that those deaths are not in a vacuum. They had to be accompanied by more injuries and there have probably been rumblings about this for awhile. Now trainers compete for owners and horses and they aren’t going to go to their peers and say something like “My horses are getting all screwed up, how about yours?” But the vets should know.
Jim Cassidy was on Steve Byk’s show yesterday and he alluded to that. He did not come out and say “We told management something was up.” because now is not the time to point fingers but he did say that weeks ago his vets told him that surgeries were way up. Cassidy also mentioned that he led a stakes horse over “who was completely fine” and she didn’t survive a turf race. I looked it up–that was Amboseli back in January who broke down in the first half mile of the Astra (which in itself is unusual since breakdowns usually happen in deep stretch or around the turn).
The question I would ask–without knowing the answer–is why did Dennis Moore leave the first time. Magna likes to shake things up and it also tends to cost cut where it can. I know some people want to ride a hobby horse and point fingers at the sport particularly when it serves their agenda but how much of this is capitalism at work combined with historic weather. After all, from a distance, riding a tractor doesn’t look like a high skill job does it?
4 Likes
LA Times posted a list of the horses with some info about each, and their death date. https://www.latimes.com/sports/more/…306-story.html
Santa Anita is up against the San Gabriel mountains and historically gets more rain than even downtown LA. Cypress, home of Los Al, had probably gotten even less than downtown. The areas probably have pretty different soil and, while there’s base and footing on top of it, what’s underneath is going to impact the ability of the soil to drain
It is also colder in Arcadia, though it’s been unusually colder everywhere in the area, and colder could equate to less evaporation from the surface.
2 Likes
Los Al doesn’t race 350+ days out of the year IIRC.
Los Al is about 34 miles from SA so I wouldn’t as Peggy noted, consider it ‘right up the street’. Check a map.
The configuration of the Los Al race track is different than SA’s.
So easy for you to wave your hands and suggest SA ‘dig up the entire surface’. You are right, soil samples won’t “solve” the problem but one must first understand what the problem is before one can solve it. Without knowing what the problem is, what makes you think that replacing the entire racing surface will fix an unknown problem? Maybe it will introduce new problems?
6 Likes
Pronzini, without knowing, would not surprise me that other types of injuries are occurring in addition to the catastrophic ones. Would not surprise me that there were rumblings on the backstretch about problems/issues with the surface.
Having said that, why would Baffert (and yeah, I know he’s not everyone’s favorite trainer) send out a nice horse like Battle of Midway for a timed work? Was he willing to take the risk or was Battle of Midway that expendable if something did happen (which it did 
)?
Why would McAnally send out a ‘favorite’ horse like Lets Light The Way for a timed work if there was concern (I have gotten the impression that McAnally is at least thought better of than Baffert)?
This probably doesn’t matter, but Baffert didn’t train Battle of Midway. His trainer was Jerry Hollendorfer.
Is there any data about non-fatal breakdowns and injuries that have happened on the track? I would think those numbers would be way up too.
[QUOTE=Pronzini;n10349841]
Trainers are not a monolithic group. They are 100+ individual small business people (and some not so small) which are situated out of the same racing “mall” if you will. They have different clients, financial and other pressures, horses and philosophies. I personally wouldn’t extrapolate across the board like that.
Secondly if I remember correctly, what Santa Anita did was close the track on virtually no notice when horsemen had already made up set lists for that day. These are athletes and you can’t just leave them in the barn. It was a really high handed tone deaf response from management.
QUOTE]
the inner training track was left open for their use on that day and the whined and cried like spoiled babies. I understand it shook up their original plans but if the decision was made for the safety of the horses and jockeys on the track; they should’ve understood. You can still get horses out onto the training track to jog and gallop for exercise. Maybe not timed work outs but you can do plenty of leg stretching trotting and galloping around the training track to get horses out of their stalls.
This recent shutdown has closed all of the tracks at SA and is probably affecting the horses more. This is why they are trying to open the training track tomorrow to allow horses to go out an exercise.
1 Like
@snaffle1987 I really feel you should lend your expertise to those who work at SA and to all the connections who lost horses. I mean you have all the answers and clearly you know how to fix it all and run a training program.
2 Likes
My bad… I didn’t check before I opened my mouth. :o
But, my thought wouldn’t change. Battle of Midway was a nice horse and had done decently after his turn to the track. Did the trainer (regardless of who) have concerns about the track; if so, why send Battle of Midway out for a timed work?
Thought I just caught on TVG (via Brittney Eurton who’s at SA today) that the training track will open tomorrow (at least 98% sure from Peter Eurton) for walk, jog, gallop.
Some of the trainers will be shipping out to Los Al, some to San Luis Rey and some to GGF. Del Mar isn’t an option at the moment due to other activities going on there.
I don’t speak for them. I don’t know what their thought process was. However before I judge someone, I hope that I put what they do in context. I don’t know what the horse population is right now at Santa Anita but it’s probably 1500 or so. The vast majority of those horses go to the main track daily even if they only work weekly. Maybe they didn’t think the problem was that bad. Maybe their barn by quirk of fate wasn’t affected. It takes a certain competitive mindset to be a racehorse trainer and part of that is often that trainers universally think that they are that much better than everyone else. That can lead to blindspots if you take it far enough. (And it is not like there were zero breakdowns before Christmas. That is not the nature of this game unfortunately).
Cassidy said that Moore got there a few days ago and expressed confidence that he can fix this. Santa Anita is giving Moore a blank check. God knows what it is costing them.
Good point. Southern California is the land of the microclimate. For people who don’t live here, it is hard to believe what a difference a few miles make. There are people who grow ornamental bananas twenty miles from me but I can’t.
1 Like
I don’t think you could come up with a more diverse list of horses if you tried. And most of the fatalities occurred on fast tracks.
