While true that Standardbreds do not break down with the same frequency as their Thoroughbred and QuarterHorse cousins, they do indeed break down. (Having said that, life on the harness circuit is just as cruel and mean and in fact usually persists longer than the other forms of racing, with the typical Standardbred’s servitude lasting up to ten years and beyond; after the racing people have had their way, the abuse often continues under the heavy hand of groups like the Amish. Then, for many or most, those same Canadian and Mexican slaughterhouses.)
Yesterday, Maytime Terror, ten, suffered a broken pastern after “[taking] a misstep during warm up” at Saratoga Harness and was euthanized.
This is horseracing – all horseracing.
Ironically, some guy named Steve made a comment yesterday about how, somehow, harness racing is different.
Lol that was my same thought, Alan. And I don’t think there’s as much exposure with Standardbreds as there is with the thoroughbreds. I know when a standardbred filly dropped dead during a race last year, which I saw in person, I couldn’t find any info anywhere on her. They don’t seem to charts like the TB racing does
USTA records are a pay service. Go to the USTA website and create a Pathway account. If you know her name you can find out anything you want to know, breeding, ownership history, lifetime race lines, etc. I would look it up for you but I haven’t had an account for years. Where did it happen?
Reblogged this on Armory of the Revolution.
Racing in any form using animals is barbaric, archaic, and must be abolished! So very, very wrong on so many levels!
I’m reading some comments from some people and they are outraged as they should be.
Many are demanding how we can shut horse racing down.
If this is any consolation I can tell you this as a person who grew up in this business in the 60’s and onward.
Horse racing has been hiding their dead racehorses for many years.
Horse racing did a very good job at conditioning us to accept all their deliberately orchestrated delusions such as “Sport of Kings,” “born to run,” “treated royally,” but now they’ve been exposed for exactly what they are.
They even controlled the end message: racehorses go out to forever, grassy paddocks when done racing to live a life of glory – of course we know now that most end up on the slaughterhouse floor.
Fast forward to now, about 40 years later, and look at what’s happening although it’s taking way too long – I get that, but at least some progress is being made to expose these human monsters for what they are doing to these racehorses and Patrick has been getting widespread mainstream coverage – unheard of.
In fact, Ray Paulick during his “View from the 8th Pole” video where he condemned The Washington Post for providing space to that “extremist” and his views.
I predict that California will be the first state to ban horse racing and I hope it’s done in the next year.
I think that it will instigate a domino effect across the country.
We’ve come a long way, but we are fighting a multi-billion dollar empire enshrined in our society and they have even convinced our politicians that we need them to create jobs for us.
The only jobs they create is on handouts, corporate welfare, and casino profits – all of which can create much more jobs in community based programs where the general population benefits and not just a bunch of racehorse abusers and killers.
Of course I would want it to end tomorrow, for the racehorses, but horse racing will be its own demise.
It’s well on its way and we have a younger generation of people who will no longer accept this.
Nobody should.
I’m of the older generation who thought horse racing was exciting. I’ve always loved horses, so I actually enjoyed watching them race. Little did I know what was really happening, we were completely fooled. Besides writing to our legislators, boycotting tracks, and trying to spread the word, what can ordinary citizens do to stop the exploitation, abuse, and ultimate slaughter of these horses? I want to help, but the problem seems so overwhelming. Supposedly this country doesn’t ‘slaughter’ horses, yet has no problem exporting truckloads of live horses (Thorobreds, Standardbreds, Quarter horses, Mustangs, and wild Burrows, just to mention a few) to Canada and Mexico! After days packed like sardines, with no food or water, exposed to freezing weather, the horses are mercilessly slaughtered! The worst is when they’re sold to China and other Asian countries, where they’re really tortured, and then brutally killed and sold for human consumption….when will this stop?
According to the USTA this mare was scratched/lame. Apparently scratched/dead is not a thing.
The standardbred industry is very good at hiding its dirty laundry. I’m very sure that the Thoroughbred industry hides most of theirs too.