From the stewards at Turfway:
Feb 9: “Halfway Joking was injured in the gate and scratched.”
Feb 10: “Claim [sale] of Grey Charmer voided; horse placed on Vet’s List.”
Feb 15: “Claim of Allinthecall voided; horse placed on Vet’s List.”
Feb 22: “Binge was injured in the paddock and scratched.”
Feb 23: “Thispointintime was injured in the paddock and scratched.”
Feb 23: “Claim of Accona voided; horse placed on Vet’s List.”
Mar 6: “Claim of One Cool Dude voided; horse placed on Vet’s List.”
Mar 7: “Mural was injured in the paddock and scratched.”
Then there was this note from the 6th race on Mar 6: “A Stewards’ Inquiry was posted when Bird Set Free flipped and unseated her rider at the break. After review, the stewards determined…that the mare caused her own trouble when she reared at the start.” That’s right, she “caused her own trouble.” Never mind that she was being forced into a metal contraption by a bunch of strange, intimidating men.
By the way, this was the 4-year-old’s 11th time under the whip, all of the “maiden claiming” variety. Meaning, of course, that she has never “won,” but also that she has been “For Sale” prior to each and every race. To say that she has never won, however, does not quite capture it. In fact, she has never finished higher than 5th, and over the prior 10 races (she was a “DNF” Mar 6) she came in a combined 153+ lengths back. No wonder her lousy human being of an owner, Lydia Epner, is trying to sell her.
This, too, is horseracing.
Thank God for the closing of Les Bois Park! Too bad for the “Great” Gary Stevens. Get a real job, dude! Whipping and shocking horses “for a living” is criminal.
Kentucky and the other states need to fold as well. Stop the abuse.
I have galloped horses on the track as well as groomed horses for the “Great” Gary Stevens here in the NW. He was at the time a very impatient & pompous man who was always in a hurry & had little or no patience towards the horses or those of us in the basic handling of the horses he rode. Glad to see some of the tracks GONE that he rode at & that we groomed / galloped horses at.
If Lydia Epner really wanted to sell BIRD SET FREE, she could find a good home for her where she wouldn’t be abused to death. Unfortunately, that’s not the objective in horse racing.
Claiming races are the only way that horses that don’t qualify for stakes races can be raced for purse money in regulated races and also be exploited by the racetracks as Pari-Mutuel gambling objects.
It’s so obvious that this filly doesn’t love to run with a jockey on her back while whipping the crap out of her! Who knows if the jockey has a hidden buzzer in hand, up the sleeve or wherever the preferred hiding place is for those morally depraved horse-abusers??? Doesn’t it make a lot of sense to use an illegal electric handheld buzzer on a Thoroughbred that allegedly loves to run?
(Remembering the video of trainer D. Wayne what’s-his-name and the jockey Gary Stevens LAUGHING while making remarks about the buzzing sounds of the buzzers being used by numerous jockeys in the starting gate and how that resembled the sound of an orchestra or something to that affect.)
When we were participants in racing we always disliked “claiming” races.