Some of Last Week’s Injured

Last week on U.S. flat tracks (racing only):

Fantastic Kingdom “vanned off” at Gulfstream
Petion Lass “sustained an injury” at Laurel (replay edited)
Ruby Lee “vanned off” at Charles Town
MacKenzie’s Halo “distanced, DNF” at Delta
Electric Youth “vanned off” at Aqueduct
Jamerican “vanned off” at Laurel
Arrivederla “vanned off” at Tampa Bay

While not all the “vanned” end up dead, most do, as borne out by our year-end FOIA reports. But even if death is not the ultimate result, the above are victims nonetheless, suffering painful injuries – in the case of the bleeders, pulmonary hemorrhage – so that some men may gamble, others chase pots of gold. (For any new confirmed deaths during the week, please see our running annual list.)

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3 Comments

  1. Looks like the list is a little light this week. I wonder if that’s because of all that “improved horse safety.” (Ha ha, just kidding.) Or is it because many of the usual death tracks cancelled due to inclement weather? OR, could it possibly be that the high-credibility CHARTWRITERS aren’t listing all the injuries, van-offs, gate carnage, and even FALLS (as we see in today’s post about Delta’s horror on Saturday.)
    Guess these kind of things get missed a lot of the time. After all, Equibase chartwriters have A LOT to keep track of, what with all those pre-injured, drugged baby horses being whipped across the same wire at once. Perhaps the chartwriter just DIDN’T SEE the fall — nor the outriders hurrying over to block sight of the struggling horse, nor the screens, nor the equine ambulance, nor medical personnel assisting the fallen rider…
    You know, all the unimportant elements of the game that are so easy to miss when you’re calculating neck-lengths and nose-lengths.

  2. Seven too many Kelly. But the weather probably had quite a bit to do with a bit seen too often list.

    • Or, my personal favorite: when everybody KNOWS what just happened — a fatal horse injury — but the obvious carnage need not be specified in the chart, because, well…the breakdown/fall/hideous horror “didn’t affect the outcome of the race.” So why memorialize it in the chart?

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