KAOS in California-Sunshine Millions To Be Run At Gulfstream Only

[fkach]

P_Dub,

>Disagree that this helps NY dirt racing. Cushion and tapeta, when properly installed, have decreased breakdown numbers and increased field size. Despite the ridiculous situation at the current SA meeting, Cushion and Tapeta have been a success.<

I was strictly talking about high quality racing - which in my opinion is the main thing that creates new fans and gets them out to the track.

[miff]

\"And people like me are betting and watching less than they ever have. Which is how this game survives last time I checked\"


Silver,

There is no voice for players, you,me and everyone. At a recent symposium in Vegas two whales flatly stated they do not bet on poly and have many whale friends who don\'t. It may be great for the small player though. As far as handle being up, it\'s pretty much like that at major dirt venues too.Breakdowns are a terrible part of the game with the surface being only one of many reasons and not the primary reason imo.

NY will look at a training track/inner track synthetic only. A surface change to synthetic is generally opposed by many outfits who would prefer to train on it but race on dirt.As far as your comments re business maybe running parallel before making profound changes, you forget the morons running this sport.


Mike

[miff]

So Cal,

Your point is excellent. The disingenuous race track operators \"hide\" behind horse safety and permit these same animals they so cherish to be loaded with lots of drugs to get the entry boxed filled. Same with the trainers who praise poly because they get more starts and earn more money.Why don\'t they ban ALL race day and in between meds if they are so concerned about the cherished animals?? Answer..$$$$$$$, they really don\'t care, the horses are just a means to an end, nothing more.


Mike

[fkach]

Bob,

With all due respect, it\'s people that think like you that are constantly screwing things up in this country. You have wonderful intentions, but don\'t understand the basics of the real world in which we live.

First let me say I\'ve grown to be a huge animal lover in recent years. The other day I spent $175 for a exotic pet vet to save my $3.99 pet African clawed frog. So I am very sensitive to your desire to save horses.

But you can\'t think about things strictly in terms of goals, desires, etc....  We live in a world of limited resources. That makes it imperative to get good value for every dollar spent. It\'s not enough to say that artificial surfaces save horses. There may have been ways to save an equal number or even more horses without taking equal risks, without putting very major meets in jeapordy, without turning parts of the industry on its head, without spending as much money, without alienating thousands of big bettors etc...

It\'s essential to always test things carefully. You want to make sure you are getting good overall value for your money - NOT just meeting an objective like saving horses.

Regardless of whether this experiment ultimately works out or not and regardless of whether we ultimately get good value from it, it was as dumb as a rock to rush in at major tracks like SA before we knew all those answers. SA is now paying a price and Del Mar paid a price when some of it\'s best horses shipped to Saratoga and took some of the luster off that meet.

[richiebee]

fkach Wrote: (bravely)
-------------------------------------------------------
 
> First let me say I\'ve grown to be a huge animal
> lover in recent years. The other day I spent $175
> for a exotic pet vet to save my $3.99 pet African
> clawed frog.

Cobra venom? Myectomy? Lidocaine and Vitamin C? Some new miracle drug the harness people got their hands on? Was the white Daimler auto seen in Nassau County yesterday?

[bobphilo]

Bally Ache,

If by definitive evidence showing cause and effect you mean do we know the mechanism by which the current synthetic surfaces reduce injuries, we have that. The developers did not just throw together junk from the backyard but combined substances whose ergonomic properties in terms of shock absorption are more similar to grass (the only truly natural surface for horses) than conventional dirt tracks. That\'s the theoretical cause and effect part. The additional statistical evidence that backs this up came from both research and development in the lab and finally in the real world where all-weathers have dramatically reduced fatalities to the extent that would be virtually impossible due to chance. This huge experiment was repeated in both the U.S. and England with the same positive results. That's about as much definitive proof as one can get.

By the way, definitive causal relationships are not even always necessary before we know something works. We still don't know how aspirin works, as well as several other medications – we just know they do. In any case the definitive proof of the effectiveness of AW's is there no matter how strictly one applies the term.

In addition, it\'s not like we can call a moratorium on racing until everybody\'s unreasonable criteria are satisfied. Horses continue to break down and die and if we are going to send horses out to the track daily, it is our duty to go with the surface that has dramatically shown itself to be safer. I cannot understand nor justify the notion of installing AW\'s to one track at a time. When the polio vaccine proved effective, did we just vaccinate kids one at a time?

Are you trying to use the New and Classic Coke example to try to show that anything new is inferior and the old stuff is better? That's a very poor interpretation of what happened. What it does show is that the inferior product (new or old) will eventually be rejected and the use of a better product will increase. Just like AW's are replacing conventional dirt.

What is becoming clearer and clear is that opponents are constantly looking for new criticism of the surface as the earlier ones are disproved, whether they be unreasonable criteria or just outright falsehoods. Someone just posted that AW's hurt the betting handle when the fact is that handle has increased where they have been installed. Eventually all that is left is the unreasonable bias and inaccuracies used to support it.

Bob

[fkach]

fkach Wrote: (bravely)
-------------------------------------------------------

>>> First let me say I\'ve grown to be a huge animal
>>> lover in recent years. The other day I spent $175
>>> for a exotic pet vet to save my $3.99 pet African
>>> clawed frog.

>Cobra venom? Myectomy? Lidocaine and Vitamin C? Some new miracle drug the >harness people got their hands on? Was the white Daimler auto seen in Nassau >County yesterday?

I\'m not sure what she gave him, but he worked 6F in 108.3 yesterday. ;-)

[miff]

Fkach

..better keep it on synthetics, it might break down otherwise.


Mike

[Bally Ache]

Bobphilo,

Bay Meadows said no to the CHRB and they made it stick.  If SA,et al had done the same, California racing would be much better off than it is now.  Would more horses have broken down in that event?  I don\'t know and you don\'t know either.  You\'re a zealot and you have been one going all the way back to when this issue was first discussed on this board.  Zealotry is never a good thing.  It\'s mindless.

Enough.  I\'m done with this.  In the end no one changes anyone\'s opinion anyway.

One more thing, allusions to civil rights and gay rights legislation have no place on a horseracing website.  Try to have some perspective.

[BitPlayer]

fkach –

A few points:

First, you seem to think that the best strategy for synthetics would be to test a few synthetic surfaces, find one that works, and then install them more globally.  The problem is that each installation presents a unique set of issues.  Hollywood had installed a Cushion Track and run two successful meets over the surface before Santa Anita installed theirs.  Perhaps remembering that the last Breeders Cup at Santa Anita was run in oven-like conditions, the people at Santa Anita asked the vendor to make sure the surface would withstand temps up to 110 degrees, whereas Hollywood had required only 90 degrees.  The changes in wax and sand that the vendor made to meet that specification are now thought to be the root of the drainage problems that Santa Anita is confronting.

At Del Mar, the jelly cable normally included in Polytrack had to be excluded to deal with Coastal Commission concerns about copper run-off.

These are multi-million dollar construction projects.  The cookie-cutter model doesn\'t apply.  Each construction project is slightly different from others that preceded it, and construction projects (whether they are buildings or race tracks) sometimes go awry for unforeseen reasons.

Second, it\'s not like California racing was doing great before synthetics were mandated.  Del Mar was getting terrible press for the number of breakdowns that were occurring.  Field sizes were small and getting smaller.  Trainers were complaining that it was difficult to get owners to send horses to California because owners didn\'t want their horses running over hard California tracks.  The mandate was not something that Richard Shapiro and the CHRB dreamed up on their own.  A lot of trainers and owners were pushing for it.

Third (and finally), with the exception of recent developments at Santa Anita, the experiment seems to be going pretty well.  See Ron G.\'s post in the Emergency CHRB Meeting thread.  I don\'t know if big bettors are abstaining, but if handle is up despite the loss of big bettors, that means small players are playing more.  That\'s a positive development for the industry.  Without small players to feed on, the whales would soon become extinct.

[Silver Charm]

BitPlayer,

In regards to your comment about there being unforseen problems with construction etc in these types of Projects I do not disagree.

But for those fans who like to forgive (which includes me), that is why they like to see scalps laying on the ground from those who FU(KED UP,

Or otherwise they tend to believe they are always being lied to again by the same group of people.............

[BitPlayer]

SC -

I\'m not scalp-averse.  (I\'ve never met Frank Stronach, but given the management turnover at Magna, I\'d guess he\'s not either -- unless his own scalp is in question.)  From what I\'ve read, Cushion Track made promises they didn\'t keep.  They should suffer the consequences.

[fkach]

bit player,

I have no opinion on which, if any of the synthetics, is best for any track in America. If all the tracks have unique needs, so be it. Then several synthetics will be required.

My view is that if an industry is going to try something new, it should test it in minor markets for a long enough time to answer all the important questions about the long term economics, durability, maintenance, implications for breeders, long term implications for the health of horses and jockeys, the reaction of big bettors, implications for owners, etc...

I never had any problem with Woodbine, Turfway, and other similar tracks being used as test markets to answer some of these questions.

I had a problem with SA, DMR, HOL and KEE rushing into it and being used as test markets because there is a much bigger downside to failure and little or no incremental gain in knowledge over using some of the other smaller markets.

If Finger Lakes was having this problem, no one would care much but we would have learned the same lesson. If NYRA puts a synthetic surface on one of its training tracks for a few years you won\'t hear a peep. But no corporation chooses to test a replacement product in its most important markets and puts the whole company at risk unless there is no way around it.

In addition, IMO, this whole argument about horse safety is 90% a crock of crap. I probably care more about the horses than 95% of all the people in the industry. IMO, if the health of the horses was really the primary issue, we\'d be running drug free like Europe and Asia and these surface conversations would be a sidewhow.

I don\'t mean to sound so abrasive and know that a lot of people have good intentions, but I think this was/is an unnecessary fiasco. I\'ll drop this now because my view is clear.

[jma11473]

Bally Ache Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Bobphilo,
>
> >
> One more thing, allusions to civil rights and gay
> rights legislation have no place on a horseracing
> website.  Try to have some perspective.



Yeah, I think that was when I knew Bob had gone off the deep end. Yes, implementing synthetic dirt surfaces for horses has the same moral imperative as protecting someone\'s right to vote or live freely...scary that you have so little rational thought left. I\'d figure you were joking except you\'re on every site saying the same thing.