Ewing was raced at Colonial Aug 8. That, apparently, was his final race as his owners then shipped him down to Florida for “reschooling” and “reeducating” – whatever that means. Today, the TDN reports that Ewing “passed away Tuesday at trainer Mark Casse’s farm in Ocala, the result of a freak accident.” (Yes, yet another “freak accident.”) The details, according to Jon Green of the ownership team: “He was out in a paddock and something spooked him and he went to go jump the fence and unfortunately didn’t clear [it] and hit a post. As he was going over it, he cracked his skull open.” Imagine that scene.
Green then added some crucial context: “Unfortunately, we forget sometimes that these horses get cranked up in the sense of being ready to be race horses and it takes a little while to get that training out of their system. … He was still pretty high-strung, just coming off the racetrack. It was an unfortunate incident for sure.”
So while this is technically not an industry kill, who and what do you suppose made this poor boy, just three, so “cranked up” and “high-strung”? How very sad.
You would think that these people having millions of dollars to spend (or should I say billions?) plus huge tax breaks, and having years of experience with Thoroughbreds and knowing their temperaments, that they would have the foresight and the money to build fencing that would prevent these types of freak accidents from happening.
I know freak accidents can and do happen to horses especially horses that have racing bloodlines but have never been raced. One of my sisters told me about one of the horses she owned that had racing bloodlines but had never been raced. He was out of a beautiful AQHA registered mare with Thoroughbred bloodlines that went back to a Kentucky Derby winner.
The mom horse, Wilma, came to them and did what she could do to get the attention of my sister and her husband. I think of the mare acting like “Lassie” on the famous television show attempting to get them to come with her and find out what is wrong. It turned out her colt (not sure how old he was but I think he was maybe 2 years old at the time) had accidentally impaled himself on a metal fence post. They managed to get him un-impaled somehow and he did survive the ordeal.
Whenever we had some high strung horses come off the track, we would put them in small paddocks first, and/or give them a small dose of ACE to prevent them from the potential of getting too excited. Imagine going from almost zero turnout or hand-walking/handgrazing to complete freedom in a pasture. Some are so damaged they don’t know how to navigate that transition. Or I would either lunge or free lunge them first to get the spunkiness out first. Sounds like this poor guy was failed by his humans, again.
Look at that face…he more than likely wanted to escape the nightmare he endured. Sad sad sad