I think many that don’t understand racing don’t understand relatively how much safer it might be than other live sporting events unless it is a big race with many spectators.
Glad to see that tracks are making progress, each as best they can.
Read that South African tracks are facing bankruptcy 
So sad about South Africa Norwegian racing was close to bankruptcy too but they were allowed to start, taxes were also lowered. Hopefully the government understands how important racing and the horse industry is to the country.
Golden Gate Fields has the green light to start racing May 14.
Happy but also wonder if the prediction by many healthcare people that another shutdown may be in the future is also correct.
All of ours shipped in to Keeneland this week to start preparing. Very excited to have racing coming back in Kentucky, even spectator-less!
:encouragement: :applause:
Spectatorless is better than no racing at all for so many different and varied reasons.
No word yet on Santa Anita but sounds like race planning is continuing. No condition book released but I’d be surprised if one wasn’t done and ready to go as soon as they receive official blessing from LA County Health Board.
I was leading up a horse to the races yesterday, it was so strange with no people around the paddock. I am so used to people looking, I wonder if the horses feels like something is missing.
Santa Anita still hoping to start racing May 15.
Just heard interview with Christina Blacker of TVG. SA will be bringing in the same mobile living quarters that actors/actresses get when they are shooting on location for jockeys and ‘quarantine valets’.
Horses will be saddled in the receiving barn with trainer and one valet… in the walking ring (IIRC), the horse will be handed off to the quarantine valet (might be in the receiving barn). The quarantine valets are SA employees and will be t taking the horses to the track to hand off to the lead ponies.
All will be wearing PPE (didn’t include jockeys). At the completion of the race, the quarantine valets will be taking the horses either to the test barn or back to their own barn to turn care back over to trainer.
Proposed plan… still waiting for blessing from LA County Health Dept.
GGF has already been blessed to start racing May 14.
First horses arrive at Churchill Downs from Fair Grounds :applause:
Klampenborg (Denmark) held their raceday today, worked well and a nice winner in the 1000 Guineas. 
So the trainers go back and forth from their homes? Bob doesn’t get to live in an RV too?
TVG has been talking to Christina Blacker and they’ve only mentioned the valets and jocks. Sounds like jocks haven’t been at the track while the trainers like Bob have still been going every day.
You’re right, no mention of trainers 
My thoughts–such as they are and with no backup whatsoever–is that 1) it would be unworkable for trainers because you would need too many RVs, no trainer with a significant amount of horses would consent to live in an RV or a tackroom and the vans would all go East and 2) Santa Anita might be banking on the ignorance about the sport of the health regulators. They might know about jockeys and exercise riders and maybe even about grooms but I bet they don’t know about trainers, jock agents, vets and vet techs, farriers, massage therapist and chiropractors; feed and shavings guys; and tack guys. Backstretches might be insular but they are not hermetically sealed like a mission to Mars might be. So I am sure if anyone asks, Santa Anita will have a testing protocol and hand sanitizer stations to show them but they are not locking down every backside person. They can’t.
@Pronzini I agree… no backstretch can be totally ‘sealed’. Can’t/won’t happen.
IMO, SA (TSG) is saying all the good, positive verbiage they can for LA Co Health to get racing going again. Sounds like the jocks haven’t been riding exercise in the mornings (partly why Drayden didn’t go to Oaklawn to ride Charlatan, out of riding practice).
I think the proposed ‘solution’ kinda, sorta isolates the backstretch (including stable hands, trainers, etc) from jocks, stewards, jock agents (if the jockeys aren’t riding, no real need it would seem to me for agents to be at the track) and any other people who aren’t active backstretch “workers” (tossing vets, feed, shavings in this “work” category).
I think LA County Health suspended racing because they don’t understand the entire microcosm that is a racetrack with horses that are (or were) racing. IMO, they caved also because of the PETA crowd jumping on off the stop racing, it kills horses band wagon and on to the stop racing because of COVID band wagon.
Christina hasn’t said (that I’ve heard) if hubby Dan is staying at the track or not. I suspect Dan’s coming home every after the morning backstretch work is complete.
Whatever TSG has proposed I believe is the same as for GGF and GGF has been blessed to restart racing this Friday.
It’s a LA County Health ‘thing’…
:rolleyes:
All those people @Pronzini mentioned would be expected to be at a normal backside pretty much every morning. It’s a bustling place. If one trainer doesn’t need a particular guy for something, another surely will. Jockey agents, whom you referenced, for example, spend a lot more time hustling rides in the mornings than they do watching races in the afternoons. Their job is all about personal contact and putting in the time.
Same could be said for most of the rest of the workers. Keep them out and the trainers might limp along for a little while. But sooner or later they’d probably decamp to a more accommodating state.
@LaurieB I get how active the backside is.
All these “new” precautions… on premises accommodations for the jocks and these “new” valet positions are people who are not there currently in a ‘backtretch’ capacity. The quarantine valets will be taking the horses from the receiving barn to the paddock for the jock to mount. The same quarantine valets will be taking the horse back to either the testing barn or stable after the race; these quarantine valets are employees of SA (not employed by the trainer or owner). No winner’s circle.
Life in the backstretch isn’t changing. Adding in a new process for afternoon racing is what is changing.
Mea culpa… as was very diplomatically pointed out to me - I’ve been saying ‘backstretch’ when I should have been saying ‘backside’ :o
Maybe I can blame it on old age??? :lol:
Globally replace in this thread… backside for backstretch please
Is there a protocol I don’t know about? I use the two words interchangeably and I have spent a fair amount of time in various backstretches.
To follow up the other point, jock agents may be the most interesting group of people on the backstretch and they usually have a job more complicated than you would think. They have to know who they can spin and how to do it so they don’t leave a trail of hard feelings in their wake. (Sometimes not possible). Between trainers and jocks, they might be juggling some of the most arrogant and immature people on the planet who often need fall guys when things don’t work out. Then again, the jock agents themselves can be some of the most arrogant and immature people you’ll ever meet because anyone with a pen and a condition book seems to think they can do it better than anyone else and successful riders can end up with a parade of folks who got their job by submarining their predecessor. Then they last only so long until someone else tells their rider “You know, you could be doing better.” This seems to happen to every agent from those who have journeymen right up to Eclipse Award winners, who after they hit the heights can find themselves replaced by someone’s son because “You could be doing better.”
There’s no way jock agents will hang out at home while their meal ticket lives at the track.
Fwiw, I use the two terms interchangeably too. :yes:
Christina Blacker did not mention agents one way or the other when I’ve heard her talk about SA’s proposal to re-start racing so I have no clue where the agents would go.
At a track such as SA, where it is open for stabling and training but not race and the jocks sounds like they are not riding in the mornings, would the agents still be on the backstretch/backside or would they be at home as being considered non-essential in terms of daily horse care and would they be put up in the same ‘star’ digs that are supposedly being installed at SA for jocks/valets that are usually used as mobile accommodations for actors/actresses? Maybe jock agents were considered not worth mentioning in the on-track temporary housing?
I dunno…
Bummed that we are coming to the end of Tuesday and still no word from LA County Health and SA was hoping to race on Saturday
SA released Overnights for racing on Friday the 15th.
I’m betting SA won’t be racing on Friday despite the fact that many other activities will be allowed to re-start… :rolleyes:
Beaches re-opening today with ‘health restrictions in place’; restrictions on hiking trails, public parks, golf courses are also re-opening. All very public, outdoors and open and hard to enforce.
Racing on the other hand, yes outdoors but much easier to enforce as either need a pass for the backside (backstretch? :lol: ) grandstands and those won’t be open to the public… only known individuals will be (or should be) on the property.
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