Dead horse at Aintree today

I honestly don't believe the jockey for one moment thought his mount had a catastrophic injury.
He may have though he'd tweaked something but the horse was still running on, at speed and in a straight line. I've never seen any jockey hesitate to pull up and dismount if a horse loses it's action.

The horse lost his hind end on landing - I've seen this in racing and in the XC phase of eventing and horses have carried on to no ill effect. Remember the footage of Devon Loch's dramatic sprawl before the finish line anyone?

Obviously it's sounds dreadful to say 'Jockey drives horse with broken back to finish line' and I'm not for one minute downplaying the awful tragedy this was but the winner was holding the 2nd placed horse and didn't seem to lose much in the way of speed. I can't understand how a horse with a broken back could physically do this.

Anyway, aside from the mechanics of the injury I have to say that if the horse had sustained a catastrophic tendon injury that was discovered post race and resulted in PTS it wouldn't be being debated half as much as it sounds so much less emotive.
 
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minesadouble said:
Anyway, aside from the mechanics of the injury I have to say that if the horse had sustained a catastrophic tendon injury that was discovered post race and resulted in PTS it wouldn't be being debated half as much as it sounds so much less emotive
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Therein lies the problem. You are quite right of course, it would not be being debated quite so much, but it should be.
 
eahotson said:
And this achieves what?
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You hope with any incident that there will be accountability, even if was an accident, reflection to see if anything could be prevented, and my preferred outcome is they lose the £67k and disqualified. This is a professional sport and no one should be rewarded for a horses death how ever it happened, for entertainment. The jockey would still get the ride fee.
It will not bring the horse back, but perhaps when riding it will be an incentive not to push through and ignore 'niggles.'

This is grim but perhaps if the racegoers were confronted the sight with a horse struggling on the ground it would perhaps spoil. their day out. Everyone else is just concerned with turnover so I have no illusions it's going to bother them.
 
I'd be 100% on board with a ban. I hate the whole scene. I hate the way they live, the constant upheaval they go through, the non-stop stress they feel. But I hate the way 90% of competition horses live. Hell I hate the way 50% of all horses live. I feel wound up A LOT just by what happens on livery yards to horses. Whether it's out of ignorance or greed doesn't make a difference to the horse.

I don't think racing is the worst out of all the horse sports. I've worked on both eventing and racing yards and they were all as bad as each other.

Whether or not PT knew what he was doing we'll never know. But I do know that any jockey who allows a horse to sustain avoidable permanent damage would not have a good time afterwards and he would know that. It doesn't make sense financially to ruin a money maker for the sake of one race.
 
paddy555 said:
perhaps it needs something along the lines of endurance, not proposing to give them 30 mins to fiddle it past but say 10 mins in the open under inspection (and no drugs allowed) then presented for a sound trot up, no saddle marks, no bit marks and a reasonable pulse rate ie a horse fit to continue. Disqualified if it fails the final vetting.
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I have been thinking this myself. Therefore only those finishing sound can be winners. Lame horses eliminated just like in endurance. I have been thinking though, that the bookies, TV companies and punters wouldnt go for this, as they like the excitement of knowing whose won as they cross the line.
But then again, those obviously not sound would have been pulled up by their jockies and wouldnt be crossing the line anyway.
 
IrishMilo said:
I'd be 100% on board with a ban. I hate the whole scene. I hate the way they live, the constant upheaval they go through, the non-stop stress they feel. But I hate the way 90% of competition horses live. Hell I hate the way 50% of all horses live. I feel wound up A LOT just by what happens on livery yards to horses. Whether it's out of ignorance or greed doesn't make a difference to the horse.

I don't think racing is the worst out of all the horse sports. I've worked on both eventing and racing yards and they were all as bad as each other.
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I'm starting to think more and more along these lines. Gleaming coats do nothing for me.
 
minesadouble said:
I honestly don't believe the jockey for one moment thought his mount had a catastrophic injury.
He may have though he'd tweaked something but the horse was still running on, at speed and in a straight line. I've never seen any jockey hesitate to pull up and dismount if a horse loses it's action.

The horse lost his hind end on landing - I've seen this in racing and in the XC phase of eventing and horses have carried on to no ill effect. Remember the footage of Devon Loch's dramatic sprawl before the finish line anyone?

Obviously it's sounds dreadful to say 'Jockey drives horse with broken back to finish line' and I'm not for one minute downplaying the awful tragedy this was but the winner was holding the 2nd placed horse and didn't seem to lose much in the way of speed. I can't understand how a horse with a broken back could physically do this.

Anyway, aside from the mechanics of the injury I have to say that if the horse had sustained a catastrophic tendon injury that was discovered post race and resulted in PTS it wouldn't be being debated half as much as it sounds so much less emotive.
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I mentioned up thread about a horse who was hit by a car. Sorry to be graphic but that horse ran a fair distance with one of its legs partially severed. I would imagine adrenaline played a part in that and the same could be true for GD.

I do remember Devon Loch, in fact seeing the photos of GD reminded me of this also.
 
Grand National jockey Toby McCain- Mitchell was banned for 10 days. This was because he forced his tired horse to continue before it fell at the final fence. The horse Top of the bill required veterinary treatment after the fall.
 
Let’s turn this around. What would the same jockey have done if he had been schooling Golden Dancer over jumps at home and the horse had gone splat over a fence in the same fashion?

He’d have pulled him up immediately, that’s what, he wouldn’t have whipped him on to the end of the gallops. It was the race, the £££s, the stewards, his livelihood, the angry punters who made him drive that horse on rather than pull him up - that is the abhorrence that is racing. This is what the racing fans support - the horse as a vehicle to make money.

As to why the horse was able to continue at all with a fractured sacrolilac joint, one can only assume that initially it was a hairline but fairly stable fracture line in the joint which then rapidly unravelled as the horse continued. Whether it was ever a survivable injury even if he had immediately pulled the horse up is a moot point.

When I had a large mare here with a hairline fracture in her wing of ilium she had to be kept standing in cross ties for months and was not even allowed to lie down in case her pelvis gave way. Was she sore on it? Yes, even though it was ‘only’ a hairline fracture she was incredibly sore initially for a few days.

She did come good on it, though.
 
Tiddlypom said:
This is what the racing fans support - the horse as a vehicle to make money.
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That is what all people who watch and buy Badminton and Burghley TV and tickets support, or subscribe to ClipMyHorse to watch the SJ, or pay for dressage demos. Let's not forget that ALL of those horses are a vessel for the riders and owners to make money.
 
suestowford said:
I mentioned up thread about a horse who was hit by a car. Sorry to be graphic but that horse ran a fair distance with one of its legs partially severed. I would imagine adrenaline played a part in that and the same could be true for GD.

I do remember Devon Loch, in fact seeing the photos of GD reminded me of this also.
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Yes, i remember one year in Pau ( France), I was leading Berryville in the big race, he broke his shoulder jumping the water jump
and kept running with his left front hanging, it was horrendous...

The vet had troubles to pts as he was so excited, i had to hold on to him, it was the day, I stopped working in NH yards......

Walking back to the stables with only the bridle is very hard, his lass was in tears and I wasn't much better....

The jockey, David Cottin didn't get hurt and he was also sad, he was a real horseman and is now a decent trainer.
 
It's a shame as I don't actually think amongst all the competitive horse sports that racing is inherently flawed. Would a horse rather gallop in a straight line for 3 minutes than perform a dressage test? Probably. But there are so many things wrong with the system driven by money and greed it is just impossible to try and unravel now. Horses started too young and the amount that end up on the scrap heap, standards of welfare in how they're managed and their needs ignored, training methods, the difficulty of hurdle courses pushing them to exhaustion and resulting in catastrophic injuries. I don't even know where you'd start.
 
3OldPonies said:
To the person writing about the small trainers and syndicates, and I know this is going to open a new can of worms. . .

I confess to having my doubts about syndicates, as I see it they are/can/could be a way of actually diluting the sport and leading to a proliferation of unnecessary breeding in order to fulfil a requirement for cheap horses to be syndicated out to the masses who simply want to be able to say they have a racehorse. I should go on to clarify though that I realise this is not always the case, there are good syndicates of knowledgeable people, equally there are also syndicates that just comprise 100s of 'owners' with little or no knowledge looking for a cheapish day out rubbing shoulders with the wealthy and celebrity owners.
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That is an absolute load of tosh! There is no need to set out to breed lower grade horses, plenty are produced via quality breeding projects.
And the multi syndicate’s Reynolds is talking about are hardly low value, the horses cost usually between £50-£100k.
 
HaplessHorse said:
Honestly, I think I’d prefer to be a racehorse than a dressage horse.

The race yards I’ve seen over the past couple of years do seem to provide paired/trios turnout, the horses look healthy, and every Ottb I’ve met so far seems to have been very nicely handled by people, and extremely approachable. Can’t speak for the feeding, though.

(One yard I saw from a distance when visiting a different attraction next to the race yard - over 20 were turned out that I could see. Another I saw as part of a syndicate because my nan had brought a syndicate membership that we didn’t particularly want, but decided to have a nose about on a tour when we had nothing better to do. Plus I’ve met 2 or 3 ottbs at various stages in their post-racing lives.)

I’m not convinced that the standard of life for eventers/dressage horses/sj horses at the top level is hugely different to that of a racehorse, because these are high-value horses, for whom turnout may be considered financially risky. They will also be fed for performance. Again, not an excuse, but an issue that permeates most top-level equestrian sport.
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Totally agree and I've said so before. Add to that not drilled in schools, no lever bits, no crank nosebands, no draw reins, no spurs, no overweight riders - their lives are far more horse friendly that the vast majority of dressage horses, show jumpers, eventers and show horses.

I have a relative who worked for VW for years, I've seen how her horses are kept first hand on several occasions, they're turned out daily, spend their summer hols in large groups turned out in parkland and the vast majority are friendly, affectionate and love human attention. I've posted pics here before of them out in the field in the summer, a massive group of happy, sociable horses. I've had two horse from there myself, real characters, proper pets, great manners. One was retired because he simply didn't enjoy racing.

All that said, I think PT is an utter disgrace, he's experienced enough to know that horse wasn't right before they got to the last fence and I agree with whoever it was that said he would have recieved some sort of punishment had he been an amateur or youngster. I just hope that adrenaline carried that horse along and he didn't suffer as much as he could have.
 
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marmalade76 said:
Totally agree and I've said so before. Add to that not drilled in schools, no lever bits, no crank nosebands, no draw reins, no spurs, no overweight riders - their lives are far more horse friendly that the vast majority of dressage horses, show jumpers, eventers and show horses.

I have a relative who worked for VW for years, I've seen how her horses are kept first hand on several occasions, they're turned out daily, spend their summer hols in large groups turned out in parkland and the vast majority are friendly, affectionate and love human attention. I've posted pics here before of them out in the field in the summer, a massive group of happy, sociable horses. I've two horse from there myself, real characters, proper pets, great manners. One was retired because he simply didn't enjoy racing.

All that said, I think PT is an utter disgrace, he's experienced enough to know that horse wasn't right before they got to the last fence and I agree with whoever it was that said he would have recieved some sort of punishment had he been an amateur or youngster. I just hope that adrenaline carried that horse along and he didn't suffer as much as he could have.
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Well, I am glad for you, you seems to have only visited nice yard where horses are turned out and ridden by nice lads in adequat tack but it's not always the case-

In France, many NH horses ( especially at G Macaire in la Palmyre ) the horses are ridden with two strong elastic tied from the girth to the bit, they galop and even jump like this.

They don't go out without their head being strapped down. The reason of their head being strapped down is for them to use their back and not to hollow.
Most of the time, the elastic aren't well ajusted, too long or too short. For a rider, it's an horrible feeling, the horse galoping on his forehand.

As for the paddock, well, i have never seen it, the lack of staff and the number of horses doesn't permit turn out.

As for the bit and noseband, they are sometimes ridden with strong noseband, ringbit, spurs and by frustrated, under paid and overworked rider than don't give a sh.....

The horses going out on the last lot ( usually 5 lots ) are the worst, they are usually the lame one, the half broken one and the riders being tired and fed up, it's worst
in the winter as it's cold and wet.

The rider often calls the less talented horses ( chien or dog) and instead of finishing them properly after riding, do a bad job in order to go home.

If you type Guillaume Macaire on you tube, you can see a short training vidéo.

Lack of staff, pressure from the owners, financial problems are chronic and even if some trainers are better, the majority treat horses like disposal tools.

If you type Guillaume Macaire on you tube, you can see short training vidéos
 
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Janique said:
Well, I am glad for you, you seems to have only visited nice yard where horses are turned out and ridden by nice lads in adequat tack but it's not always the case-

In France, many NH horses ( especially at G Macaire in la Palmyre ) the horses are ridden with two strong elastic tied from the girth to the bit, they galop and even jump like this.

They don't go out without their head being strapped down. The reason of their head being strapped down is for them to use their back and not to hollow.
Most of the time, the elastic aren't well ajusted, too long or too short. For a rider, it's an horrible feeling, the horse galoping in his forehand.

As for the paddock, well, i have never seen it, the lack of staff and the number of horses doesn't permit turn out.

As for the bit and noseband, they are sometimes ridden with strong noseband, ringbit, spurs and by frustrated, under paid and overworked rider than don't give a sh.....

The horses going out on the last lot ( usually 5 lots ) are the worst, they are usually the lame one, the half broken one and the riders being tired and fed up, it's worst
in the winter as it's cold and wet.

The rider often calls the less talented horses ( chien or dog) and instead of finishing them properly after riding, do a bad job in order to go home.

If you type Guillaume Macaire on you tube, you can see a short training vidéo.

Lack of staff, pressure from the owners, financial problems are chronic and even if some trainers are better, the majority treat horses like disposal tools.

If you type Guillaume Macaire on you tube, you can see short training vidéos
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I’m not sure it helps to start looking at how horses are kept in other countries, shall we compare working horses, dancing horses, horses for tourist rides etc etc. there are many many horses having much worse lives than a racehorse at Aintree.
 
bonny said:
I’m not sure it helps to start looking at how horses are kept in other countries, shall we compare working horses, dancing horses, horses for tourist rides etc etc. there are many many horses having much worse lives than a racehorse at Aintree.
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Indeed. I forgot to add equine college horses to my list - zero turnout and riddled with ulcers IME.
 
KikiDee said:
It's a shame as I don't actually think amongst all the competitive horse sports that racing is inherently flawed. Would a horse rather gallop in a straight line for 3 minutes than perform a dressage test? Probably. But there are so many things wrong with the system driven by money and greed it is just impossible to try and unravel now. Horses started too young and the amount that end up on the scrap heap, standards of welfare in how they're managed and their needs ignored, training methods, the difficulty of hurdle courses pushing them to exhaustion and resulting in catastrophic injuries. I don't even know where you'd start.
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I've been trying to figure out how to say this for such a long time - thank you so much for literally writing my thoughts for me!
 
It was a bad mistake and he horse sprawled. But he picked himself up and continued in a straight line. He was of full adrenaline, what may be visible to someone watching isn't always so to the rider. My vet said that detecting hindleg lameness by the rider is very difficult. If he had damaged the front leg the jockey would have realised and pulled up straight away. In fact, we don't know, that he was fine until rounding the bend make the injury unstable. I've know humans walk into hospital with broken necks.
 
minesadouble said:
I honestly don't believe the jockey for one moment thought his mount had a catastrophic injury.
He may have though he'd tweaked something but the horse was still running on, at speed and in a straight line. I've never seen any jockey hesitate to pull up and dismount if a horse loses it's action.

The horse lost his hind end on landing - I've seen this in racing and in the XC phase of eventing and horses have carried on to no ill effect. Remember the footage of Devon Loch's dramatic sprawl before the finish line anyone?Yo

Obviously it's sounds dreadful to say 'Jockey drives horse with broken back to finish line' and I'm not for one minute downplaying the awful tragedy this was but the winner was holding the 2nd placed horse and didn't seem to lose much in the way of speed. I can't understand how a horse with a broken back could physically do this.

Anyway, aside from the mechanics of the injury I have to say that if the horse had sustained a catastrophic tendon injury that was discovered post race and resulted in PTS it wouldn't be being debated half as much as it sounds so much less emotive.
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You could see that is another reason for withholding prize money. If the horse is not conditioned enough to perform well but the prize money is sufficient to take the risk for entry, is there the thought, should we risk it?
If this altered training methods and even breeding, because race are breed for speed as the main factor, to be brutal if its doesn't make on the flat it's probably 'waste' by five unless it can go over hurdles, is it perhaps a better outcome for a lot of horses.

How many are bred each year, and mare returns.
www.racingpost.com

'Parts of the industry are in denial' - British and Irish foal crop declines by almost ten per cent in a year

With the British and Irish foal crop plunging by a third in two decades, are we already in a crisis?
www.racingpost.com www.racingpost.com
 
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In fairness I can genuinely believe horse maybe did not feel it - when I was kicked in the face, I wanted to help mum sort the horses out and didn't understand why she said 'absolutely no f ing way, stay there and do not move'.

But after such a fall the status quo should be pull up immediately so the animal can get checked out.
 
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FieldOrnaments said:
In fairness I can genuinely believe horse maybe did not feel it - when I was kicked in the face, I wanted to help mum sort the horses out and didn't understand why she said 'absolutely no f ing way, stay there and do not move'.

But after such a fall the status quo should be pull up immediately so the animal can get checked out.
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I'm sure it would have been argued in this case that the horse didn't actually fall, so that rule wouldn't have helped here.
 
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