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A CALL is being made to change the rules for Optional/Claiming races to protect owners who want to "patch up" injury-plagued horses to get them off their hands.
Owners said that claims should be voided for horses that do not finish races, horses which are debarred from racing for two or three months and horses that are no longer racing prospects but were put in a claiming race to be gotten rid off.
The paddock has now been described as a hospital with most of the horses on the "sick" list.
There is also another suggestion to change optional claiming events to races in which runners are sold through an auction system after they compete.
The format would allow prospective buyers to examine horses' soundness immediately after racing which would be an incentive for owners and trainers to provide runners with rest or treatment if they have physical ailments rather than using medication to continue to allow racing even if a problem is lurking.
This would encourage trainers to stop and fix the problems rather than just "patch up" a horse and put the animal in a claiming race to be "sold."
In the lower claiming races most of the runners are unsound, some with minor problems and other with major ones. Owners are urging the racing authorities to take action and make changes in the system which would be in the best interest of both owners' horses and prospective owners.
Owners claim that they are forced to spend large sums of money on some horses they claim because of the high cost of surgeries and the time that lead to the use of medications as temporary solutions.
One owner said future debate on the overall topic would likely include how rules about voiding claims could be written to fairly encompass a variety of situations.
For example, he said, if a jockey pulled up a horse before the finish line, fearing something was wrong, but no physical problem was detected, perhaps a claim on that horse should not be voided.
On the other hand, any rule should not influence riders to avoid easing runners who are in distress, he said.
As far as an auction system goes, post-race sales have been conducted in England and were part of early American racing tradition.
He said, however, those events, which were called "selling races", disappeared in the United States around the 1920s.
Regardless of which approach might be adopted, the owner described the proposed changes as having an "exciting potential" to discourage the racing of unsound horses.
There could be many benefits, including fairer and safer competitions and more opportunities for future careers for thoroughbreds. |
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