More Positive Racing News From Mountaineer
 

http://www.thoroughbreddailynews.com...d-at-landfill/

I don’t want to hear excuses. This looks really, really bad. The trainer has no idea about anything and the Director of Racing Operations at Mountaineer hung up on the TDN when they called.

I don’t think any of us are naive when it comes to where euthanized horses end up, but again bad optics in a sport that doesn’t need anymore right now.

It’s hard to sell non racing fans on how much the sport loves its horses when they end up in a landfill with their front wraps still on after an injury.

Disgusting.

The tattoo should reveal who the owner of record is.
He needs to go to jail and get a lifetime ban.
Mountaineer - should be boycotted until that guy there is fired.

They know who the owner is, it’s in the article. They are still collecting information but what I’ve heard is the horse was euthanized after being injured and instead of taking the horse to where they usually do, someone at Mountaineer allegedly brought her to the landfill. Again, not sure how true that is, the what I’ve heard.

Another situation where no one in the industry is talking while the story takes off.

The owner? What did she (Vickie Stewart) do?

There's only one question to be answered about this awful circumstance: How did it happen that this particular horse wasn't brought to the rendering facility?

'Industrial Scale' Slaughter of Australian Racehorses Revealed

https://www.yahoo.com/sports/mass-sl...004101570.html

Because they can't help but operate in an underhanded manner, a put up job by PETA. To quote Turo Escalante, "What a surprise"..

I give Vickie Keith of the National Thoroughbred Welfare Organization a lot of credit. She said fix was in from the outset.

From DRF..

Big surprise. PETA is nothing but a collection of uneducated scumbags.

Obviously PETA is despicable but does it really change anything? Why are we celebrating that PETA might have staged the photo? Anyone pay attention to Mountaineer at all and some of the nonsense going on there? I’m no Pat Cummings fan but he sums it up pretty well here.

https://www.paulickreport.com/news/t...ide-nightmare/

Frankly, PETA has an even bigger voice now because of the disaster at Santa Anita this winter that was handled about as poorly as a situation can be handled. Hollendorfer still can’t run horses in his name in New York or at any TSG track. You couldn’t walk into Saratoga this summer without being met by protestors. The CHRB covering up Justify’s positive, regardless of how inconsequential it was. Should I go on? Sure most horses are treated well, but too many are not. Where is the outrage from the industry leaders (whoever they might be) to take a stand?

When is the time to acknowledge things have been getting worse? I’m not sure putting our guard up works anymore. There is a lot of good in the game but pretending the bad doesn’t exist seems shortsighted. I don’t have many answers but I also don’t make a living in the sport. I just love it and have for over half of my life. I participate in it with my hard earned money but even I am beginning to wonder at what cost? Whenever anything bad is brought up, the answer can’t be “but we do this good.” It has to be “we can and will do better,” and then doing better.

Kudos to Santa Anita for doing better, but it took a monumental crisis for it to happen. Sorry for the ramble but if a lifer like myself questions his own participation sometimes, what does that say about others? Those of you that know me know how I feel about racing. I just want it to be better. The horses and all who participate deserve it.

What's your solution Hossy? Close all the C tracks? Propose something.

By the way, understand that these frantic calls to create a general panic aew all designed to do one thing: Feed into the Jockey Club glee for their ill-conceived 'Integrity Act', USADA and an undermining of the state regulators. Good luck to everybody with that plan that horseplayers will be 'asked' (made) to pay for.

Your response is EXACTLY what I’m taking about Steve.

Why do I need to propose something? Am I being paid by the industry? How about holding the people that get paid for this stuff accountable and not a bettor like myself? Where are their solutions?

Your inclination to bite back anytime something negative is said just pushes people like me away who have spent a long time and a lot of my money in this game. Haven’t I earned the right to be disgusted by some of the stuff that I see?

I appreciate and understand that you like to look at and highlight the positives. But it’s okay to acknowledge that everything isn’t always rosey.

Let's consider Barrier Trials. Rather than gate drills or workouts, use Barrier Trials to establish a minimal level of competition that must be met for horses that have been off the track for 12+ months. This would prevent the uncompetitive situations cited in the article by mandating that reasonable racing standards (perhaps ~50-51 seconds for 4f) can be met.

Bite back? I'm just asking you for input.

I agree that there are several concerns with the proposed federal legislation, but the current system of state regulation is not working and needs to be overhauled or, at a minimum, improved dramatically. Of the four most significant racing jurisdictions (New York, Kentucky, California, Florida), how many of their racing boards are doing an adequate job of oversight? Not a majority. And things don't get better with many of the smaller jurisdictions.

In the post you responded to I acknowledged I don’t have many answers.

Mountaineer has more horses running off 4 year layoffs than I’ve ever seen. They allow Burton Sipp to train there. There is a lot wrong there. I’m not sure if closing it is the right thing but some regulation would help, no?

You had a horse act up at the gate at Charlestown last weekend that was allowed to run, who had to be taken away by van after the race bleeding pretty badly from his stifle.

Do you agree more needs to be done?

It's definitely a mixed bag of adequate, passive, zealous, overzealous, indifferent.

One element of the state regulatory body discussion that is difficult to navigate is the political appointee v. industry participant. People attack agencies like California/CHRB over the abundance of interest-conflicted, but there's equal disdain for bureaucrat functionaires who land on commissions and are without a clue about what they're commissioning. So, what's the answer?

Florida, bizarrely, has virtually no commission and is regularly the most difficult place to get things like the model rules initiative implemented.

ARCI does the best job it can to promote responsible, active regulation. Understand first and foremost that the states are not going to relinquish their control because it means a loss of significant revenues. And you have to work within those parameters to shore up deficiencies in the jurisdictions.

This isn't the first horror story abut Mountaineer so I'm not shocked. If you search you can find a lot of these stories from many tracks over the years. I learned my lesson. The answer to this dilemma is about as easy to solve as an Israel / Arab peace negotiation.

Very unlikely to change.

Sad and it pisses me off to no end.

Pete ? Pete Zagarine !

Since nobody has any suggestions I'll throw one out there to get the ball rolling. Feel free to tell me what a dumb idea it is and how it will never work because I expect it.

How about...

In each state where horse racing exists, there is one business, entity, company (whatever) that handles all bodies of any horse that has to be put down in their state. The business will have one headquarters who handles all the individual states. I think having a governing body is better than having everyone playing by different rules. This will be funded by the state tracks and would include thoroughbreds, harness, quarters. If a horse needs to go, they call one place.

Any deaths would include racing, works, sickness and any other reason that a horse has to be put down at a track. That facility can euthanize and take the body for proper burial or cremation. They handle it from beginning to end and record everything including the connections, the reason, the condition of the animal, where it was buried, etc... Careful record keeping can be used so there is not an abuse of this service by shady owners. It may also be informative and this may help in keeping injured horses out of slaughter houses. This isn't going to be a glamorous job but someone will do it.

I'm one who believes in saving horses, not killing them. However if it has to happen then lets do it. People need to step up and stop bullshitting and treat these animals with the respect they deserve.