Horse racing found itself in the spotlight on Saturday afternoon but not quite in the way that it wanted to. The day was supposed to be about the 141st running of the Preakness Stakes, about the undefeated Nyquist trying to keep his record intact, about the possibility of another Triple Crown run at Belmont in…
On Sunday afternoon at the Gideon Putnam, The Jockey Club held its 63rd annual Round Table Conference on Matters Pertaining to Racing. The event was presided over by Stuart Janney, newly elected as chair of the organization following the resignation of Ogden Mills Phipps, who had served as chair since 1983. The man at the…
If you follow me on Twitter, you’re going to get – in addition to tweets about New York City, politics, feminism, and the New York Rangers – lots of tweets about cats. And cat rescue. And the treatment of animals in factory farms. And cruelty-free products of various sorts. You’re also going to get a…
Last Friday night, the local Time Warner News NY1 aired a report about fatalities at Aqueduct Racetrack in Queens, linking horse racing with the contentious Central Park carriage horse issue. On the face of it, it’s not a stretch to consider the issues together; both, after all, raise issues of equine welfare; both have made…
This Friday and Saturday at Santa Anita Park in Arcadia, California, hundreds of horses will take to the track for the Breeders’ Cup. One hundred and eighty horses have been pre-entered in 15 races, and if Dr. Mick Peterson has anything to say about it, they’ll all come home safely. Concerns about the safety of Thoroughbred racing have never…
In the five months since the first target date for the Aqueduct injury report came and went, rumors and questions abounded about its contents and the process by which it was compiled. Through much of the Saratoga meet, whispers of new release dates circulated weekly, with no official information coming from either the governor’s office…
“Very soon.” That is when, according to the State Racing and Wagering Board, the report from the task force investigating the breakdowns at Aqueduct this past winter will be released. The task force began its work in March, and when I spoke with task force chair Dr. Scott Palmer in April, he indicated that the…
I’m getting to be quite a fan of these little racing industry gatherings that happen from time to time, and pretty regularly in Saratoga. So far this meet I’ve attended a Racing Commissioners International meeting on medication and the Albany Law School Racing & Gaming Institute (both taking place on Tuesdays, the only dark day…
My first post on synthetic racing surfaces was on September 26, 2007, nine days after this site was launched. I suppose that I can rightly be called a synthetic skeptic; while heartened at the possibility of a surface that would decrease injuries, I found hasty, and perhaps even dangerous, the quick adoption of synthetics without…
Equine Injury Database This presentation is the one that has garnered the most attention and coverage, given its preliminary findings about equine injuries. Dr. Mary Scollay, a veterinarian and equine medical director of the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission, presented the timeline for the Equine Injury Database: October 2006: Proposal for tracking injuries at the Safety…
Brooklyn Backstretch 