Virtually without exception, “broke down” is racing-speak for dead; “vanned off” translates to a better-than-even chance of dead.
Broke Down:
Bonnie Lass, Aug 18, Delaware 2
M B and Tee, Aug 21, Saratoga 7 (reported “euthanized”)
Little Tower, Aug 22, Del Mar 3
Celzo’s Birdie, Aug 22, Ferndale 4
Ludicrous, Aug 23, Saratoga 4
Matagorda Bay, Aug 24, Gillespie 2
Vanned Off:
Shot Rod, Aug 19, Mountaineer 1
Angel of Fire, Aug 19, Mountaineer 2
Arctic Thunder, Aug 20, Remington 5
Sorcerer’s Queen, Aug 21, Evangeline 7
Im Funny for Money, Aug 21, Evangeline 9
Dawn’s Destiny, Aug 21, Louisiana 8
Salti Dawg, Aug 22, Albuquerque 1
Senorita Sangria, Aug 22, Monmouth 3
Sal’s Boy, Aug 22, Monmouth 5
Bernco, Aug 23, Albuquerque 1
Squad Leader, Aug 23, Albuquerque 1
Parading Gold, Aug 23, Canterbury 8
Page an Angel, Aug 23, Delaware 3
Tu Tu Tango, Aug 23, Evangeline 1
Twin City Thunder, Aug 23, Evangeline 6
Bold Perspective, Aug 23, Gulfstream 1
Hope Some Gold, Aug 23, Los Alamitos 5
Chubaroni, Aug 23, Monmouth 10
Thunder Stric Again, Aug 24, Albuquerque 8
Casanova Kiddo, Aug 24, Ellis 8
Tycoon Cat, Aug 24, Monmouth 6
Graeme Crackers, Aug 24, Saratoga 5
Blitzball, Aug 24, Timonium 3
Other Casualties:
Bubba’s Gold, Aug 20, Charles Town 8, “bled profusely”
The Gray Hound, Aug 23, Golden Gate 3, bled
Camp Copper, Aug 23, Timonium 7, “returned bleeding”
Mean Maxine, Aug 24, Mountaineer 5, bled
Brassy Boy, Aug 24, Mountaineer 9, bled
My Pal Val, Aug 24, Thistledown 7, “pulled up lame”
Bonnie Lass is dead. From FB page, Tim Ritchey, her trainer, owner and breeder
“Tim F. Ritchey Racing Stables That was a very sad day for us all, especially as we had bred and raised her.
‘We can shed tears that she has gone or smile that she has lived’. You never get used to it.”
Please, no negative responses.
Thank you, Sue.
RIP Bonnie Lass…and I shed tears…for me, it’s not a choice.
This is Horseracing Wrongs. With the exception of personal attacks, Patrick allows all comments…pro-racing and anti-racing. I’ve never asked of readers to restrain from commenting on my strong anti-racing posts and I never will. It doesn’t work that way.
One of my OTTB’s, Saucon Creek, was with Mr. Ritchey. He suffered a “career-ending” bowed tendon. Saucon’s owner, Michael Leach, was told Saucon was being retired to a “vet in Montana”. BOTH Ritchey and Leach bore the responsibility of Saucon’s life. Saucon didn’t go to a “vet in Montana”…he was put back on the track. He ended up at Great Lakes Downs where he broke down again (of course, Equibase does not reflect this). There were no tears for Saucon’s suffering. Only deceit.
I find it incredible that now we are told we can simply choose to smile that a dead horse once lived…then there shouldn’t be a problem getting used to the maimed and killed horses. Just deny it and smile.
(Correction, Saucon’s last race was at Prairie Meadows. He was rescued at GLD.)
Joy, I hear you, but if you want to continue to receive info about horses from trainers, Ritchey being one of them, then you must also work WITH them to get that information.
I also assume when you say “one of my OTTBs,” you mean that Saucon is now grazing in your backyard. I do not see your name listed on the EquiBase page, but I DO see where he ran at Prairie Meadows, where he finished 7th, last by 27th lengths.
Sue, just to clear up any confusion on your part, Saucon Creek is currently in Joy’s backyard. Joy has picked up many horses discarded by the racing industry. You are correct that, oftentimes, you have to “suck up” just like I did with Ed Harvey, a kill buyer middleman, who operated openly on the backside of Beulah Park for years. However, even “sucking up” doesn’t always save a horse’s life. Perfect examples would be Miss Fancy Gold and Cowboy Buck. Also, I hope that you, too, have “saved” horses discarded by racing and those horses are currently enjoying life in your backyard!
Sue, work “WITH” them? In other words, don’t EXPOSE them? I receive plenty of information about racehorses that have been used and abused by their racing connections…I don’t need to keep their hideous secrets. I am sick and tired of the so-called horse welfare advocates who exclaim how much the damaged horse’s trainer “loves” their used-up racehorse in order to not p*** them off and keep a “working relationship”. It says a lot about those “loving” trainers, doesn’t it? And the thing is, you’re correct – don’t tell the truth because if they find out, they’ll make their horses pay the price. That is what happened in Michigan in 2008. At the end of the 2007 GLD meet, a hidden camera investigative report included a trainer admitting he ran injured horses and another’s horse was filmed racing that night…only to come into the CANTER-Michigan program the very next day with pre-existing chip fractures. This piece was aired on a major Detroit television station and word of the exposure of Michigan’s horseracing’s ugly reality spread like wildfire. The “horsemen” were furious. In retaliation, they demanded the racing commissioner deny licenses to the CANTER volunteers at Pinnacle’s inaugural 2008 meet. The commissioner agreed, and injured racehorses stood in their stalls waiting for help. Yet racing owner/sometime trainer Jaron Gold – the Midwest’s largest supplier of horses to a Canadian slaughterhouse – had free reign in the shedrows.
Reporting the death of Bonnie Lass would have been sufficient. It’s peculiar why the commentary of Ritchey’s sadness and his “never getting used to it” was deemed necessary to include…along with your request that no one comments “negatively”. Well, it’s pretty damned negative that the little four-year-old filly, earner of nearly 58K for the Ritchey family to split with her other connections, endured a catastrophic injury and is now dead because of it. And then to be encouraged to smile because she once lived? That’s the first time I’ve heard that one and WOW is that insulting…insulting to the dead filly who just wanted to live like the rest of us. That is nothing to smile about.
Most definitely you will not see my name listed as an O/T/B in Equibase. Saucon Creek, a rescued ex-racehorse, is a member of my equine family. And yes, Saucon “folded badly” in his very last race. A second breakdown in his short racing enslavement.