Young Dan
Wise Dan seems “strapping” now, easily dispatching rivals despite weight, weather, and rough trips, but he was once a maiden, looking a little green and eager. Partymanners has posted on YouTube the reigning Horse of the Year’s first career win (his second start), a 15 1/4 length romp at Turfway in 2010. “This son of a gun is either a freak or he’s crazy,” an exercise rider told trainer Charles LoPresti after an adventurous training gallop at Keeneland back then.
Wise Dan was given a Beyer speed figure of 101 for winning the Firecracker Handicap (replay). There are four possibilities for his next start, all at Saratoga — the Whitney, Fourstardave, Bernard Baruch, and Woodward. It would be a lot of fun to see him in the Whitney or the Woodward — he hasn’t raced on dirt since finishing second in the 2012 Stephen Foster.
“I’d like to win a Grade I on dirt with him this year,” LoPresti told the Churchill Downs press office. “If we get a Grade I on dirt with him and then keep him going and get a few wins on the grass and then get to the Breeders’ Cup, maybe he’ll get Horse of the Year again.” Sounds like a plan.
Suffolk Notes
At today’s Massachusetts Gaming Commission meeting, state racing director Jennifer Durenberger told the panel that Suffolk Downs’ request to cut planned live racing on Thursday, July 4, and Tuesday, July 9 and 16, due to the current horse shortage, has been approved. The dates will be made up in October, and Tuesday racing is now scheduled to begin on July 23 — maybe there’ll be more horses on the backstretch by then.
Durenberger also reported on the new 5% withholding requirement on winning wagers of more than $600 that went into effect this May. There are no hard numbers yet on how many bettors have been affected, or what the hit has been to handle, but Durenberger did note that when New Hampshire enacted a similar tax in 2009 (it was repealed in 2011), the state’s simulcasting handle declined by approximately 20% in 2010-2011 — during the same period, national handle declined 8.6% and Massachusetts simulcasting handle declined by 4.8% — and expressed concern that the tax was making Massachusetts racing unattractive to horseplayers. “It’s a chilling effect based on tax evasion,” said commissioner James McHugh, taking issue with a lack of “institutional pressure” on bettors to report winnings below the current IRS thresholds. Commission chair Stephen Crosby recognized a real flaw with the new requirement: “Not being able to offset your winnings with your losings seems crazy,” he said. So it is! May a legislative remedy pass quickly — representative Kathi-Anne Reinstein of Revere attached an amendment striking the withholding to a supplemental budget bill that was passed by the Massachusetts House last week and is now before the Senate.
Tammi Piermarini has opened a significant lead in the jockeys standings with 19 wins and $202,884 in earnings through racing yesterday. Four of those wins came for trainer Michael Catalano, who’s 5-for-5 so far this meet. Three came with K Girl’s Dream, who’s won three straight since June 3.
6/28/13 Addendum: See Durenberger’s prepared remarks, included in the June 27 meeting packet (PDF).
6/30/13 Addendum: Via the NEHBPA, the revised 2013 racing schedule (PDF).
No Trace
When Kentucky mandated last year that state veterinarians give pre-race Lasix shots, in place of private vets, the results were eye-opening, reports Ryan Goldberg in the final installment of TDN’s drugs in racing series (PDF):
Besides the volume of Lasix [which declined], murkier drugs largely disappeared from post-race tests. Scollay said she had seen evidence that a drug called GABA, short for gamma-aminobutyric acid, was commonplace in Kentucky. The amino acid, which is present in the supplement “Carolina Gold,” is endogenous to horses as well as humans — it’s the predominant receptor blocker in the central nervous system. It has a pain-mitigating and calming effect that can conserve a horse’s energy prior to a race. However, because it’s naturally occurring and leaves a horse’s system within three to four hours, finding suspicious levels in post-race tests is difficult.
Its use in Kentucky was apparently curtailed once regulatory vets came in. The “noise” in post-race samples all but departed. Lasix is administered within four hours of a race; private vets were apparently giving GABA at the same time. There was no trace.
Wow. I wonder if the same thing happened in New York after the NYRA detention barn — in which horses were monitored for six hours before a race and only state vets could administer Lasix — opened in 2005, and if the concentration of Lasix in the blood, as well as the presence of other drugs or supplements in test samples, rebounded after it closed in 2010?
More Than Strength
Diane Crump reflects on her pioneering career as a jockey with Mary Simon, and the debate over whether women are strong enough to ride in races:
“You know what? None of us is that strong when compared to a horse. It’s the feel you have for them that matters. If you can get along with them, relate to them, those are the things that make you a horse person and a rider. Brute strength has no relevance at all …”
Or as Julie Krone, another rider who accomplished a number of firsts for women in racing, told Ed Zieralski recently:
“I know one thing. It takes both genders to ride a racehorse, the feminine for soft and subtle, and the masculine for strong and effective.”
Shocking
Ray Paulick continues digging into the sudden deaths of 36 California racehorses from July 1, 2011 to March 31, 2013, and finds that:
… one trainer with 2.5% of the horses and 1.5% of the total starts has had 19.4% of the sudden deaths over a 21-month period.
That trainer has hired a public relations and crisis management firm to handle the attention his startling numbers have aroused. They’ve been tweeting.
6/21/13 Addendum: The CHRB has issued a statement on the ongoing investigation into the sudden deaths (PDF). “The pathology and toxicology work has been completed … with no indication of foul play. This aspect of the review is believed to have been as thorough of an examination as has ever been done anywhere in the world with such cases.”
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Jessica Chapel writes and edits in Massachusetts. Railbird is a Thoroughbred horse racing blog published from June 2004 to July 2019. More / Contact
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