National meeting. First fatality.

Alec Swan said:
Any point is provable by statistics, and I wouldn't be surprised to find that "The Flat Earth Society", rely upon such evidence. ;)

Alec. :)
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Way to go Alec!

There are lies, damned lies, and statistics and these are generally perpetrated by sanctimonious, Guardian reading, social scientists :D
 
fburton said:
Alex, I hope that was said tongue-in-cheek, because by that argument we might as well abolish all figures of a statistical nature because they have no useful meaning.
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fburton, when statistics are used to prove a point, then an entirely different set can be pulled from a sleeve, to disprove the first set. If you don't believe me, just look at Successive government unemployment figures, or trade figures, and they're all statistics. ;)

Alec.
 
Can we have the have the true statistics for the % of horses that lose their lives racing then, please? I assume it must be greater than the % of starters, because many horses race more than just once. The question is how much greater.
 
fburton said:
Can we have the have the true statistics for the % of horses that lose their lives racing then, please? I assume it must be greater than the % of starters, because many horses race more than just once. The question is how much greater.
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What I can't work out is whether starters means number of horses than run once, or does it include every horse that starts in every race during the year (as that would include multiple runs)...

Anyone know?
 
fburton said:
Can we have the have the true statistics for the % of horses that lose their lives racing then, please? I assume it must be greater than the % of starters, because many horses race more than just once. The question is how much greater.
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The last year I have statistics for is 2011. In that year, 20,714 different horses raced in at least one race (Flat and NH combined). 157 horses died on the track.

So 0.75% of all individual horses who raced in 2011 died on the racecourse.

ETA: The average number of runs per horse in 2011 was 4.35 (Flat & NH combined) so 90,105 starters. As a percentage of starters, fatalities number 0.17%.
 
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Well it ain't the race it was. The fences looked really soft and some of the horses got away with some terrible errors. Hopefully all horses and jockeys are safe but NOT a true jumping test any longer, more a true staying test.
 
silu said:
Well it ain't the race it was. The fences looked really soft and some of the horses got away with some terrible errors. Hopefully all horses and jockeys are safe but NOT a true jumping test any longer, more a true staying test.
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I'm happy it was safer this year and touch wood I don't think there were any fatalities this year!!
 
That loose horse that came second though, which horse was that? I'm impressed! It jumped all the jumps, found accelleration at the end and kept itself safe all through the race. Shame the jockey fell off, it might have won!
 
BigBuck's said:
The last year I have statistics for is 2011. In that year, 20,714 different horses raced in at least one race (Flat and NH combined). 157 horses died on the track.

So 0.75% of all individual horses who raced in 2011 died on the racecourse.

ETA: The average number of runs per horse in 2011 was 4.35 (Flat & NH combined) so 90,105 starters. As a percentage of starters, fatalities number 0.17%.
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This figure is completely useless. No-one has a problem with horse deaths on the track in flat races that I know of. To fail to split NH jump racing and all forms of flat racing is simply to obfuscate the issue, since the overwhelming majority of deaths occur in NH jump races.
 
cptrayes said:
This figure is completely useless. No-one has a problem with horse deaths on the track in flat races that I know of. To fail to split NH jump racing and all forms of flat racing is simply to obfuscate the issue, since the overwhelming majority of deaths occur in NH jump races.
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Well isn't that a lovely sentiment. So as far as you and your cronies are concerned, the death of a Flat racehorse is less important than that of a jumps horse?
 
BigBuck's said:
Well isn't that a lovely sentiment. So as far as you and your cronies are concerned, the death of a Flat racehorse is less important than that of a jumps horse?
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But of course, if a 2yos fetlock shatters, no matter. A 13yo jump horse breaks a leg, ban racing! :rolleyes:
 
In reality its easier to fix a broken jumps horse than it is a flat horse because the ground is softer and the speed less. Plus you go into jumping for the long run and wont just shunt off a horse because they have a short race career.
 
Stencilface said:
But of course, if a 2yos fetlock shatters, no matter. A 13yo jump horse breaks a leg, ban racing! :rolleyes:
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BigBuck's said:
Well isn't that a lovely sentiment. So as far as you and your cronies are concerned, the death of a Flat racehorse is less important than that of a jumps horse?
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We all know that horses die all the time. I have always made it clear that my issue with NH jump racing is that the proportion of horses which die is an order of magnitude greater than the proportion of horses that die doing any other sport. For me this is compounded by the fact that the deaths are as a result of these animals being used as the product by which to generate huge betting revenues, and that the deaths would not occur if the money issue was removed, because the racing would stop if it was not financed by betting money.

Completely separate to NH racing, I do also have an issue with 18 month old horses being broken and ridden and raced at two, but not with older horses flat racing, where the risk seems to me to be little greater, if any, than, for example, hunting or eventing.

The true cost of NH jump racing to horses expressed as a proportion of all horses in training who raced over fences or hurdles at least once needs to be known. To combine the figure with flat race deaths produces only a completely and utterly meaningless statistic. To publish only deaths per number of starters is disengenuous because it sounds so much more acceptable to say 1 in 250 starters than 1 in 50 horses.
 
It was not disingenuous, I was responding to a request for statistics which did not specify a split. Pardon me for thinking all horse deaths are equal and should all be acknowledged.

The 2011 figures for NH racing are 129 fatalities from 9,523 individual horses to race at least once over hurdles or fences, or 1.35%.

There is meaning in publishing fatalities per starters as most horses don't only run once so it gives a view of the risk factor of the overall sport. It stands to reason that at an individual level, the more times you engage in an activity that carries risk, the more likely the chances of something going wrong (aka the law of averages).

For completeness, the NH fatalities per starter figure for 2011 was 0.41%, based on an average number of runs of 3.3 per horse, or 31,426 starters.
 
A wonderful race with a very worthy winner and all horses and jockeys back safe.

CPTrayes every year you ask the same questions(boring) and I have told you before to contact the BHA, how you can expect anyone on here who is not connected the the BHA to give you the figures you want is I believe disengenous. If you cant be arsed so be it but stop asking us.
 
I appreciate the sentiment Dobiegirl and certainly agree with the rest of your post but out of interest, you might be surprised to know that all the data I have quoted is published online. The runners / starters / average starts per runner per annum are from the BHA's website, and the number of racecourse deaths are from Animal Aid's website. To produce the percentages was just basic maths.

So anyone who is genuinely interested could find it out for themselves, but I guess it's often easier to spout off about obfuscation and imply some kind of cover-up than actually research the subject one purports to care about. :rolleyes:
 
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