The chartwriter’s note for the 4th at Fairmount yesterday: “Keep Attacking sustained an injury into the bend, lost his rider, was humanely euthanized and vanned off.” Again, that’s “vanned off” after being euthanized. Keep Attacking was seven years old.
As you will hear in the video, the announcer chalked it up to a wayward step. He also promised “more on that later,” which, not surprisingly, was a promise left unfulfilled.
It’s a given that racehorses are victims of abuse. Also, I would say “violent” abuse.
It definitely sounds like they are victims of violence when they suffer broken bones that are shattered into little bits and pieces. Sometimes not all of the pieces of bone fragments are found in the dirt, according to what has been reported in necropsy reports. I sometimes wonder how many pieces of shattered bits of horses’ bones are in the dirt of the racetracks. I’ll never know the answer to that question.
I totally agree that there is nothing humane about the tortured life of racehorses being held captive and forced to perform as gambling chips for someone’s entertainment. Having their death sped up by a veterinarian using the syringe is less barbaric than blunt force to the head, but it is still sickening.
I always stick on the words “humanely euthanized.” I understand the euthanized part, end of their suffering, but there is nothing about a race horse’s life that is humane.
That is horrific!
Many tracks we have ridden on were little more than real old Hwy. road rails! Some were made of wood rails like those used on ancient hwy.s of the 1930`s. We have personally taken a good , well taught horse to ride by us before the races with a hammer & nails to better secure the rails with & pound in popped nails back in the posts. The so called safety rails are still hard has metal when hit by a horse or rider! Many times our now defunct track would have temp. rails made of flat plastic at the end of the 1st turn on the outside due to the starting position of the gate. Always thought that flimsy wind movable rail was not safe, despite it being approved by the Jockeys guild.
Correction on my post – fit should be gut. A filly I saw racing gutted herself on the rail.
Another sad thing to notice, watching this video, is the safety rail on the inside of that track. All the waves, imperfections, and dents in it are from horses going over, through, and crashing into it over the years. Mind you, the “safety” part of that rail is for the jockeys to roll under if their horse breaks down and they fall, like in this case. I would have thought it would be soft rubber, but it’s not. It is either fiberglass or sharp PVC. I saw a horse fit themselves on it when it tried to leap it without enough clearance.
This whole industry is stepping wrong. May the different factions in this industry continue to cannibalize each other but at a faster rate.