The Triple Crown needs Restructuring

[miff]

Bell,
 

Check out the overall comments of the Maryland Chief State Vet re Barbaro early morning and during the Preakness warmup, he speaks of an aggressive horse striding out.Also of interest is the comments of the surgeon Dr. Richardson ...\"We had this joint completely open and in this particular horses case,I could see no damage of any preexisting injury\"

Prior to that he states \"that frequently that fracture does have some prexisting damage\" but he didn\'t see it here.


The preexisting injury theory or stress from prior big negative theory is not what they THINK happened.We\'ll never know for sure.


Mike

[Frost King]

Just some inside industry information. Know someone that is well connected into the Lexington breeding scene.

[bellsbendboy]

Typically insurance on a stake horse would create a premium of some 18 percent payable up front.  That would mean a payment of some 4 million.  I find it unlikely. He is probably insured for less than he is worth. Jerry would know more. BBB

[colin]

Silver Charm with all due respect I can\'t disagree more. I travel every year from Long Island to Baltimore for the Black Eyed Susan/Pimlico Special Card and Preakness Day at Pimlico. In the 10 years I have gone it is amazing what a dump the place was and has become. ON Black Eyed Susan day they get a decent crowd but think of the numbers on Preakness day. Admission to the infield was $55 and 80% of that 118,000 crowd was on the infield. The other people paid between $20 and $155 for tickets to the grandstand. This is what keeps Pimlico in business. I would think it would take an act of God for Pimlico to change the date and mess with the cash cow that is the Preakness. Barbaro\'s injury is tragic but the Derby winner usually fares well in Baltimore and this small world that we horseplayers live in wherein we understand that running in the Triple Crown series leads to these horses never being the same again but to the suits at Pimlico I doubt they care much. I think your heart is in the right place but that is not what rules the business world. Good luck on the Belmont E

[davidrex]

     Can\'t you just see Stronach getting control of N.Y. and moving the Freakness and belmont forward  2 weeks.
The man would champion his purchase with a cause that would stop the pain and agony for both man and beast.

[magicnight]

NY Times reports that insurance on Barbaro was increased twice - after the Florida Derby and after the Kentucky Derby. No word on the total dollar value, nor any of the increments.

[imallin]

Miff,

In a perfect world, sure, every horse would have this type of exam. Its just not economically feasable. The 4k claimers at Penn National have to run to put on the show, the show must go on. If you did an mri on every horse on a particular card at a low rung track, you\'d see a lot of christmas tree lights on those exams.

My point about the Derby is that this is a race, and the impending preakness 2 weeks away, where all sense and logic go out the window. This Derby is a race where not one trainer is going to care if his horse is lame, he\'s going to enter the race for his own training career. Look at that 20 horse with mike smith, that bull horse, (forget his name). Anyway, he was owned by a syndicate, west point i think...they just want to get in the gate so their syndicate can say, \"we get owners to the Ky Derby\". If that horse had the earnings and was broken down, he\'s STILL going to be entered and run. He\'ll be covered up with heavy meds and put out there.

Personally, any trainer (hendricks, etc) who run a LOSING ky derby horse back in the preakness are insane. Its stupid. Bro Derek had a hard derby race, wide, losing a shoe and all out to the wire AND had a suspect workout at Santa Anita before the race....that horse had no reason to be at pimlico. He was supposed to be sent back to SA to rest. Hendricks put his own selfish personal interest before that horse and you see what happened. BD washed out and ran like crap.

I think when you are dealing with millions of dollars in purses and tremendous exposure for these trainers (career making exposure) there\'s tremendous incentive to run a horse who doesn\'t belong.

IN a perfect world, every horse would have an exam, even the platers at the smaller tracks. But at this high of a level with the national exposure, we can\'t have horses breaking down on national tv like barbaro did. a stringent exam AFTER the derby would eliminate any horse with a problem.

[Silver Charm]

The thought of him standing at the winners podium and giving two winners awards speechs four weeks apart is enough to kill the game if it doesn\'t kill itself first.