I was able to confirm that 5-year-old Here Comes Drz was euthanized after breaking down Tuesday at Charles Town. Here is the career claimer’s recent history:
On September 14th of last year, Here Comes Drz is sold by Our Sugar Bear Stable to Dario Vasquez; trainer Catherine Somers takes over for Bruce Brown. Price: $7,500.
On January 18th of this year, Here Comes Drz is sold to Nickel Dime Stable; Michael Pino replaces Somers. Price: $7,500.
Sometime between March 1st and April 15th, Here Comes Drz is sold to Adam Ingram; Lewis Craig replaces Pino. On the day he died, Here Comes Drz was going for $4,500.
Four different trainer/owner teams in seven months – for a horse who was not done growing. “Connections” caring about their charges? Please.
“Connections caring about their charges” ! As we well know, it is “connections” caring about money. Like so many others, Here Comes DRZ had a short stressful life, bounced from stable to stable until he was finally killed like so many others. And there are those who defend this because of how much the horse was “loved”, etc.
The Claiming Game is the worst possible death spiral for our horses. Claiming reform has to occur now.
Yes, Rose, there is a great deal of “care” involved but only when it comes to the money.
Stop drugs on race day and that means no threshold levels but like the rest of the world — ban all drugs on race day with threshold levels ONLY on naturally occuring drugs — and there won’t be enough horses to fill a claiming races — end of claiming races. TA DA.
Of course, deaths and injuries would be reduced NOW if the vets whose job it is to do a pre-race lameness exam on every horse racing would DO a hands on flexion lameness exam instead of pretending that watching a horse in the post parade and loading at the gate qualifies as a lameness exam (while these horses are on drugs, joint injections and are being ponied with a person on their back and when at the gate tend to be fractious anyway). My FARM VET gives a full lameness exam to a horse I want to buy to simply WALK down the road. No money is going to be bet on him. Others’ lives are not at stake and no bettors to be duped but my trail horse gets a complete veterinary school taught lameness exam and most racehorses do not.
FOUR different owners in only SEVEN months…nothing but a stressful life for a creature that craves routine…and then he is killed. What a horrific short life. RIP, Here Comes Drz. I am just so very, very sorry that no one was ever there for you.
Thank you for taking the time to find out what happened to Here Comes Drz. He now has peace. Disgusting what he had to go through. RIP Here Comes Drz.