It\'s a Bird tested positive for naproxen following his win in the Grade 2, $500,000 Oaklawn Handicap on April 4, according to an official with the Arkansas Racing Commission.
http://www.drf.com/news/article/104118.html
How much of a penalty should the connections receive for a class 4? (Naproxen is more commonly known as Aleve.)
I want the game cleaned up too, but taking a look at it from an owner\'s perspective for a moment, would I be OK with, say, losing all of the purse money over the rough equivalent of an aspirin? I don\'t think so.
Perhaps the penalty should be dependent on what the level of the \'overage\' was, so the commission can take an educated guess on how much pain/lameness was being hidden? If it is a trace amount, a slap on the wrist may be the right penalty?
Kentucky recommends that it not be used 5 days before the race so it must take a while to clear the system.
In NY it can be given 48 hours out.Pretty innocent stuff, used liberally around the track and not surprisingly by Wolfson.Lack of uniform rules on permissible drugs also a problem for the intellectually challenged Lords Of Racing.
Sight,
Is there a \"normal\" period of time for this stuff to clear.
Mike
Wolfson had two different class 4 positives with Can\'t Beat It back in \'06 (though one was so minor the penalty was later reduced).
Here we go again. Someone tests positive and people leap in and say \"it\'s no big deal.\" Why are they giving this stuff to a horse to race? If YOU needed Alleve to go out and race I would send you home and tell you to go to bed. There\'s a reason for these rules, and the last thing we need in racing are \"medication apologists.\"
Why on earth do you want to see horses run if they need this kind of medication to get around the track? I don\'t care if you\'re an owner, or whatever the hell you are, what\'s the difference? If your horse isn\'t fit to run without this so-called \"aspirin\" then he can\'t run! Put him back in his stall with some warm milk. What is so hard to understand about that? Is it odd to try to protect horses from abuse when they can\'t say \"you know, I don\'t that aspirin is going to do it today boss.\"
Now you can continue this thread with the usual suspects saying it\'s no big deal, it\'s only aspirin, and they shouldn\'t get suspended. But you really want to clean up the game. RIGHT!
HP
HP,
Are you kidding, you don\'t know that horses with all sorts of minor ailments are out there racing every day at every racetrack.Many of them have been given helpful legal drugs up to cut off time.
Napronex is very common and horses DEFINITELY need help with their aches and pains otherwise there would be no racing as we know it.The overzealous that are not aware of the help that these animals need are in the dark as to what is going on with the legal stuff.
Now,if it was a monster dose on race day(don\'t know details) then I agree,hammer the guy.Otherwise this is common help for soreness/inflammation that may not have passed in the usual amount of time.
Cali allows Bute to help the horse with it\'s issues and it\'s banned just about everywhere else.
Mike
miff Wrote:
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>
> Now,if it was a monster dose on race day(don\'t
> know details) then I agree,hammer the
> guy.Otherwise this is common help for
> soreness/inflammation that may not have passed in
> the usual amount of time.
>
>
> Mike
Agreed. That was what I was trying to say.
HP Wrote:
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> Here we go again.
> I don\'t care if you\'re an owner, or
> whatever the hell you are, what\'s the difference?
> If your horse isn\'t fit to run without this
> so-called \"aspirin\" then he can\'t run!
Try a little common sense.
If I wake up with a mild headache, I don\'t crawl back into bed -- I take a couple Aleve and go to work. Big deal. It\'s just not the same as taking hits off of a crack pipe. The law and my employer fully understand the difference between minor analgesic medication and much stronger, performance altering substances: the former are legal and socially acceptable, the latter are not. There is a reason for this, namely, order of magnitude: as far as any other effect than relief of minor pain, aspirin-class medications don\'t do jack shit.
Absolutist thinking in the equine \"War On Drugs\" is a waste of time and energy -- we are never going back to just hay, oats and water. Efforts to create uniform medication rules and stiff penalties for serious infractions are useful; an overblown hue and cry over something as trivial as an aspirin just distracts from more serious issues.
>> Sight,
>> Is there a \"normal\" period of time for this stuff to clear.
>> Mike
Depends upon liver and kidney function (as with humans). As some have already accurately said, 5 days provides ultimate safety, but in 48 hours in most horses it should be gone.
If the drug is far less than the pharmacologic amount needed to influence the horse (trace amounts), to me that\'s very different than a more significant amount in the horses\' blood (given closer to the race, etc)
We can test now and detect literally \"whiffs\" of drugs. If your barn help uses cocaine off duty, your horses can test positive for it simply from contact transfer from their hands, without blow ever being in your barn or on their person.
Good reference: The Racing and Medication Testing Consortium http://www.rmtcnet.com/content_modelrules.asp
Note that it\'s far more of a performance-altering threat to give a horse caffeine, than anabolic steroids.
Class 1: Stimulant and depressant drugs that have the highest potential to affect performance and that have no generally accepted medical use in the racing horse.
Examples: morphine, heroin, cocaine, cobratoxin
Class 2: Drugs that have a high potential to affect performance, but less of a potential than Class 1. These drugs are 1) not generally accepted as therapeutic agents in racing horses, or 2) they are therapeutic agents that have a high potential for abuse.
Examples: barbiturates, valium, caffeine, codeine, mepivacaine/lidocaine
Class 3: Drugs that may or may not have generally accepted medical use in the racing horse, but the pharmacology of which suggests less potential to affect performance than drugs in Class 2.
Examples: Acepromazine (tranquilizer), boldenone (Equipoise, an anabolic steroid), clenbuterol, testosterone, stanozolol
Class 4: This class includes therapeutic medications that would be expected to have less potential to affect performance than those in Class 3.
Examples: Tylenol, Zyrtec, cortisone & dexamethasone & prednisone (corticosteroids), isoxsuprine, ketoprofen, bute (phenylbutazone)
Class 5: This class includes those therapeutic medications for which concentration limits have been established by the racing jurisdictions as well as certain miscellaneous agents such as DMSO and other medications as determined by the regulatory bodies.
Examples: Tagamet, Prilosec, Zantac
Some pretty insulting stuff here.
Maybe the response should be
\"we have rules, and he broke them, but it\'s okay.\"
Common sense indeed...
HP
The \"common sense\" stuff I\'m referring to involves examining the rules to see if they make any sense at all -- zero tolerance for Aleve? That\'s ridiculous.
Common sense would seem to dictate that since this is an everyday substance that is widely used (at least by humans, possibly less so in horses these days), some minimal threshold should be established to guard against things like possible passive exposure, environmental contamination, and incomplete elimination of what is a legal theraputic medication.
Sorry if you are insulted, but if you can\'t draw a distinction between an aspirin violation that is possibly being recorded due to a poorly thought out rule, and a serious med violation, I can\'t help you.
And if you want to keep beating the \"but, it\'s the rule!\" drum, go ahead, but doing so won\'t advance the campaign for reasonable and uniform drug rules one inch. \"Zero Tolerance\" needs to be used wisely and sparingly, for the most egregious and obvious transgressions, like the use of elephant juice and cobra venom. But for aspirin? Please.
Sight-- they need to re-evaluate Clenbuterol.
So then you need to beat the drum that says \"let\'s get better rules.\" If the rule is \"poorly thought out\" then that needs to be the main part of your effort, right? I\'m all for it.
If the OVERWHELMING MAJORITY of trainers can comply with this rule and Wolfson can\'t, don\'t you think this needs to be addressed?
Based on my limited research...there have been numerous advisories to horsemen about using naproxene. There are guidelines about how to use it and when to stop using it to comply with the rules. It doesn\'t sound like something that a front line trainer would really have a problem understanding...
HP
HP Wrote:
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> If the OVERWHELMING MAJORITY of trainers can
> comply with this rule and Wolfson can\'t, don\'t you
> think this needs to be addressed?
Yes, of course -- although I would point out that the \"overwhelming majority\" of trainers don\'t win nearly as much as Wolfson does, and therefore don\'t have their horses tested as often as Wolfson.
Winning invites increased scrutiny, and too bad about that, Messrs. Wolfson, Dutrow, Lake, et. al. -- you\'ll just have to live with it -- but I think that the assumption that numerous other \"lesser\" trainers are somehow in total compliance with the rules is a bit faulty. Absent testing of ALL horses, how do we really know who\'s totally \"clean\" and who isn\'t? Hell, I haven\'t been a saint all my life -- I\'ve just never been caught.
> Based on my limited research...there have been
> numerous advisories to horsemen about using
> naproxene. There are guidelines about how to use
> it and when to stop using it to comply with the
> rules. It doesn\'t sound like something that a
> front line trainer would really have a problem
> understanding...
I don\'t believe for a minute that Wolfson doesn\'t understand the rules. I also don\'t believe that he would risk hundreds of thousands of dollars in purse money by cutting it too close on withdrawal times. I haven\'t seen the specifics yet, but I have a hunch that we are looking at a trace amount here that might be due to human use of Aleve and subsequent incidental transfer to the horse.
I suppose I\'m going to look pretty foolish if the Ark. Racing Commission comes back with a number that would indicate that Wolfson shoved a whole bottle of the stuff into the horse on the day of the race, but I\'m betting on something innocuous here, like a groom with bad knees taking his morning Aleve, then touching feed, or a bit, etc...or even dropping a tablet on the barn floor. We\'ll see.
I only know I heard the same argument on Pletcher recently and the positive was upheld. We\'ll see...Wolfson certainly deserves his chance to defend himself and maybe some of you guys can go with him! Just joking...
HP
HP Wrote:
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> I only know I heard the same argument on Pletcher
> recently and the positive was upheld. We\'ll
> see...Wolfson certainly deserves his chance to
> defend himself and maybe some of you guys can go
> with him! Just joking...
>
> HP
Fair poke at fun. I defend these guys here sometimes, partly as a devil\'s advocate, and partly because it just doesn\'t follow that they can be so successful AND stupid at the same time. Hell, I\'m plenty stupid at times. Maybe I should open a stable, and get rich.
The positive on It\'s a Bird will be likely be upheld -- zero tolerance means zero. He\'s busted...unless Arkansas does with naproxen what Illinois did a few years ago on another drug, and retroactively implement thresholds.
Hopefully, the commission will temper the penalty to somewhat match the level of naproxen detected...if they are even allowed the discretion to do so, that is.
I\'d hate to be the owner that loses a six-figure purse over a trace finding, simply because years ago, some political hack thought \"Zero Tolerance\" on aspirin was a good way to show that they are \"tough on drug cheaters\".
Why anyone would run a horse who \"needs\" to use that type of medication specially on race day doesn\'t make sense and there\'s lots of negative side effects associated with that drug .
I agree with you again Rick. However, regarding this...
\"I\'d hate to be the owner that loses a six-figure purse over a trace finding, simply because years ago, some political hack thought \"Zero Tolerance\" on aspirin was a good way to show that they are \"tough on drug cheaters\".\"
In this situation if you\'re the trainer and I\'m the owner you\'re fired right after the hearing where they uphold the positive and take back the cash. It\'s part of your job to comply with the rules. Not to debate the validity or the quality of the rules.
HP
HP Wrote:
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> In this situation if you\'re the trainer and I\'m
> the owner you\'re fired right after the hearing
> where they uphold the positive and take back the
> cash. It\'s part of your job to comply with the
> rules. Not to debate the validity or the quality
> of the rules.
>
> HP
That would be your right as an employer, but IF the positive was due to a trace finding that was simply out of my control, and you couldn\'t understand this -- I\'d quit you just as fast as you might fire me.
I\'ve worked for unreasonable people before. I\'ll bet you have too...are you still with them?
Rick-- you don\'t know how funny that last line was.
\"I\'ve worked for unreasonable people before. I\'ll bet you have too...are you still with them?\"
(short answer - laughing) No. I\'ve never worked for anyone I would call...\"unreasonable\"...but I have worked for Jerry!
Rick...this really depends on the level of responsibility you would assign someone. I would listen to an explanation for sure. But you\'re going to have a hard time convincing you are not responsible, even if it\'s a \"trace amount.\" As a trainer, you\'re supposed to be supervising everything and everybody involved with the horse...right?
HP
HP Wrote:
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> As a trainer, you\'re supposed to be supervising
> everything and everybody involved with the horse...right?
>
> HP
\"Everything and everybody\"? No, because it\'s not possible. The majority of trainers are not with the horse (or even around the barn) 24/7, which is the only way that standard could be met...and then only if the trainer never slept.
Barns and stable areas at most tracks are open-air environments with adequate but not necessarily airtight security -- that alone would seem to cast doubt on how tightly a trainer can control his horse\'s environment.
Even if security is top-notch, how hard would it be for a licensed person to walk down the shedrow of a competitor\'s barn and toss a tablet or two into a stall, for a nice little piece of sabotage?
I\'m reaching, sure, but the point I\'m trying to make is legit, I believe: \"absolute responsibility\" sounds great...looks great on paper...and is an impossible standard. It\'s an imperfect world we live in, where most rules have exceptions. That\'s why I am so leery of the whole zero tolerance movement.
We obviously see things differently, HP: you seem to want rigidity on this issue -- yes or no, black or white, on or off. I submit that when living, breathing mammals -- human and / or equine -- are involved in most any situation you can dream of, things are rarely so clear cut.
Good discussion. You get the last word.
from DRF article...\"Arkansas has a zero-tolerance policy on naproxen, according to a commission official.\"
Isn\'t this the same Arkansas that wanted to put Larry Jones on the carpet for having a chiropractor work on one of his horses?
I get that tolerance of medication and performance enhancing drugs are a slippery slope--but the real problem is lack of uniform rules across the industry. The real cheaters are probably ahead of the testing curve, just like in Olympic Sports involving humans.