One of the many horses in need (Sarah K. Andrew)

This week’s “Good News Friday” over at the Paulick Report does indeed contain some good news, at least for one horse. The post highlights that Mary Lou Whitney does in fact lead through example in the arena of aftercare. And that IS very good news, however a few things struck me as disturbing, to say the least.

A couple of years ago, Daily Racing Form columnist Jay Hovdey told the story of a gelded son of Storm Cat, Storm Legacy, that Penn National trainer Pete Tardy wound up with after the owner said he no longer wanted him. When the horse could no longer race, Tardy checked the Jockey Club foal papers and found something he’d never seen before – a note that read: “If for some reason you are unable to care for this horse please contact us.” With that note was the telephone number of Marylou Whitney’s farm office in Kentucky.

Admittedly it’s hard to draw a conclusion from a sample of one, but it’s downright demoralizing that this sort of behavior might not be the norm. Also not uplifting was this from the operator of Equine Encore Foundation, the horse rescue operation mentioned in the post:

I have been operating Equine Encore Foundation for six years and every time I accept another horse (I have 63 and more waiting in the wings), I contact the breeder, and Mrs. Whitney is the first to ever respond.

This calls to mind something else I read this week over at Blood-Horse. It’s a proposal by Gary Biszantz, an owner who is also board member of Tranquility Farms, a rescue, retraining and adoption operation. He that suggests that money from uncashed tickets and takeout be used to help fund aftercare:

Takeout on wagering handle as extracted by the tracks and uncashed pari-mutuel tickets give us numerous opportunities to take a very small percentage of these funds and place them in escrow accounts. At year’s end these funds could be distributed to accredited retirement and rehabilitation farms all over the U.S. that want to take care of the horse and desperately need funding.

The closest thing to a mention of breeder responsibility or owner responsibility was this:

The gentleman who expressed his opinion that most Thoroughbred owners can’t afford the long-term care for retired horses is correct. Certainly some can, as we have done at Tranquility.

It’s not so much that I have a problem with his suggestion. I actually really like the uncashed ticket idea but I find it disappointing that the only group asked to help are players. I do my small part by donating a percentage of my winnings on days where I cash over $200, but shouldn’t everybody involved in racing bear some responsibility for this issue, particularly breeders and owners? Why not make the Jockey Club Checkoff Program mandatory, for example?

No doubt there are a billion ideas out there that have already been blogged about, posted on forums and written about in the media on the many ways this issue could be addressed. But the lack of responsibility highlighted in this one incident if f-in’ appalling. Hats off to Mary Lou Whitney, and anyone else who steps-up to address thoroughbred aftercare, but those who don’t really ought to be publicly shamed.

Perusing the comments at Paulick elicits different experiences of the issue. One commenter with experience in rescue notes the opposite experience from Equine Encore Foundation:

My experience in rescue, on the contrary, has been with very few exceptions, breeders contacted will help. If they can’t take the horse, they will send money, and/or call around to help find a place for the horse.

Let’s hope that this experience becomes more of the norm for ALL the folks to who work tirelessly to address aftercare, not just occasionally.

06/01/2011 Update: here’s a happy “after” photo of the horse pictured above.

Posted by dana on Feb 11 2011    
Filed Under: aftercare, 2011, Rescue, Retirement

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Remember two days ago when I said this:

If I had a holiday wish this season, it would be to see the industry support it’s own more often and particularly in the high profile circumstances where non-racing related charities tend to get the most support by our industry. Not only would it help raise awareness for the racing related charities, it would probably be some inherent “positive” marketing by showcasing an industry that’s concerned and supportive of it’s equine and human athletes.

An editorial entitled “Out of the Gate” in today’s New York Times is a prime example of why I said it.

When the Kentucky Derby rolls around each year, few ordinary fans are aware of the grisly waste of horseflesh that underpins the self-proclaimed Sport of Kings. One of the unacknowledged traditions of racing has been wholesale neglect of glorious thoroughbreds once their competitive days are done. Notions of happily ever- aftering in the bluegrass are largely myth.

While the editorial makes some fair points it hung a lot of sweeping generalizations on one (horrifying) case (Paraneck Stables). Is there a problem? Yes. Should the industry being doing more to address it? Hell yes. Are there places in the industry already taking measures to address the issues? Yes, and one is cited in the editorial but not without taking a shot:

The crackdown is welcome but late in coming to a multibillion-dollar industry that can make a humane show of ministering to its celebrity champions while gracelessly relegating thousands more to destruction at the bidding of “kill buyers” who work the sport’s fringe.

To make matters more annoying, a friend recently pointed out to me that a non-racing charity that is frequently supported by racing on it’s biggest days, Susan G. Koman “Race for the Cure”, has some corruption issues of it’s own!

But back to racing:

As the upstate scandal spread across the Internet, equine care charities and ordinary people have been helping the victimized horses to sweet resurrection as ranch retirees and recreational companions.

They are shepherded by pioneer protective groups like the Columbia-Greene Humane Society/Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and the Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation. The foundation has been saving thoroughbreds since 1984, when it began buying horses for rural prisons, to be cared for by minimum-security inmates. “The little guy just wants to run free,” one inmate said of his horse. “And I don’t blame him.”

What I find so galling about the Times editorial is that they fail to give direct mention to places like Another Chance 4 Horses, which actually “broke” the Paragallo story by posting it on their site (from there Paulick picked it up). Yet they cite the (deserving of praise) Columbia-Greene Human Society by name as if they were the only ones involved. As often as the industry fails to support it’s own, the Times minimizes groups within the industry working on the problems, or so it seems to me.

So c’mon owners, tracks and industry organizations, let’s support our own not only big race days but always! Next time you send out a press release check and see if the charities you’re supporting support those within the industry trying to address it’s issues… and perhaps then the New York Times will be forced to editorialize about it!

Update: Upon seeing this tweeted reaction to the NYT editorial and googling, I was pleased to find this passage about some of the excellent things a few tracks are doing to address “aftercare” (as it seems it’s called):

In the area of caring for horses after their careers, Turfway Park has a “surrender stall,” where horsemen can leave horses, “no questions asked.” The track supplies food and hay until the Kentucky Equine Humane Center retrieves the Thoroughbred. Also cited in this area were Woodbine, which commits a percentage of purses to aftercare; the jockeys at Monmouth Park, who commit a percentage of their mount fees; as well as the New York Racing Association tracks and California.

Great stuff, let’s see more of it!

Additional Update: Finely makes a similar point by citing what happened to dog racing in Massachusetts.

It is a cautionary tale for every other animal-related sport that doesn’t do nearly enough to protect its competitors while racing and guarantee them safe, dignified retirements after their careers are over. Sadly, horse racing falls into that category.

Posted by dana on Dec 27 2009    
Filed Under: Industry, 2009, Media, Rescue, Retirement, Racing

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Ho Ho Hotb

Sitting around the channel 11 yule log with no racing to watch, I thought I’d take a moment to compose a little blog post as there hasn’t been much going on here at GbG. However, I have managed to choke out a few pieces here and there. Grab some nog and let’s review!

While we’re working on the more fully featured, content rich site at Hello Race Fans we have a nice series going called “Letters to a New Horseplayer“. We’ve asked a wide variety of professional racing folks and regular players to share their thoughts with potential new fans and players.

There’s some great stuff over there and we’ll be rolling out more in the coming months. I recently added mine, which I sort of wrote to myself if I had the ability to go back in time. I would have been really jazzed to stumble upon them as a super-newbie and our hopes for the entire site is to make it easy for potential new fans/players to connect and engage with racing (fingers crossed!).

You’d never know it until today but I’m also participating in the r2 collective, brain-child of Dean from Pull the Pocket. Claire Novak recently took notice of all Dean’s hard work, he’s definitely been on a roll!

His vision for the project is to have a place where industry professionals can look for inspiration, discussion and thought about how better to utilize technology to enable better products, more effective marketing and/or better customer experience. Both Jessica and I have finally starting contributing with the recent series “Top 5 Innovations of the Decade” where we polled a nice panel of independent industry media folk for their top 5 innovations of the decade. We’re up to #2, race replays, which I wrote. Monday we’ll unveil #1.

If you’re a fan of lists and/or compilations, you should keep tabs on Jessica’s list of lists. She’s compiling all of the end of the year/decade posts. There’s quite a few and no doubt there will be more by the end of next week. I won’t be doing one, or at least I’m not planning on it! However, I will have a decade related poll next week.

Thanks to all of you who made your way over to Facebook to vote the many deserving racing charities in the Chase Community Giving project. No racing charities made it to round #2 but a charity frequently supported by racing, the Susan G. Korman “For the Cure”, did make it.

If I had a holiday wish this season, it would be to see the industry support it’s own more often and particularly in the high profile circumstances where non-racing related charities tend to get the most support by our industry. Not only would it help raise awareness for the racing related charities, it would probably be some inherent “positive” marketing by showcasing an industry that’s concerned and supportive of it’s equine and human athletes.

And if Race For Education exists, why can’t something similar be set up to make it easy for owners to donate to safe retirement, injured jockey funds as well as education for family members of backstretch workers (which I think is fantastic, btw).

The way it works is that owners nominate their horse(s) to be part of the program, the owner decides how much of a percentage of their winnings get donated and the horsemen’s bookkeepers make the deductions directly from the purse distributions. Hats off to Race for Education for making it so easy for folks to donate, let’s hope for more inspired industry support in the coming decade!

Also in the inspired giving department, Kevin of Colin’s Ghost (who’s got a nice contribution to the Letter series at HRF!) has decided to use the Hello Race Fans Ad Network as his own form of giving. He’s donating all of his advertising proceeds to the DRF Preservation Fund. We’re happy that’s he’s chosen the HRF network for what can only be described as adver-giving (or is that charity-tizing?)!

And until tomorrow when racing is back in action, enjoy this odd “holiday” clip from the NYC OTB channel. Last year they just had the wreath pictured above but this year they’ve branched out and are toggling between several “wintery”(?) vignettes including ice skating and the New York Harbor. Please note the shaky camera is there’s not mine. Let’s hope this high quality programming is not shades of things to come for New York ADW users. Happy holidays y’all!

Posted by dana on Dec 25 2009    
Filed Under: Becoming a Fan, 2009, Hello Race Fans, r2 collective, Industry, You Can Help, Retirement, Rescue, OTB, Research, Racing

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For those who think that banks and Facebook are evil, I have news for you… evil+evil=doing some good. At least in the case of Chase Community Giving, which is only available on Facebook!

It can be incredibly powerful when your vote has a local impact. Chase is giving away $5 million to various charities and needs you to help pick which ones. Simply vote for your favorite nonprofit and then get friends and others on Facebook to do the same. Give your charity the recognition it deserves and needs with Chase Community Giving.

Interesting, no? I mean, being on Facebook can’t be ALL time wasting can it? The program allows people to help charities with no financial outlay by giving everyone who installs the app a whopping 20 votes. I haven’t even used all of mine yet!

The distribution is interesting too:

More than 500 nonprofits with an operating budget of $10 million or less will be eligible. The charity receiving the most votes will be awarded $1 million, the top five runners-up will receive $100,000 each, and the 100 finalists, including the top winners, will be awarded $25,000 each.

And, in case you’re starting to wonder if this has anything to do with racing, it does. There are plenty of racing charities vying for part of that $5 million dollars, and they need your help. As I clicked around the other night trying to find them all (not as easy as it seems) I noticed that plenty of the charities listed below only had a few votes and in some cases I was the first person to vote! That’s not too promising considering that I’ve seen a couple with votes in the hundreds (one of them being Old Friends!).

So, for those of you Facebook this is a no brainer… get clicking! And for those of you not on Facebook, now’s your chance to join with the clear conscious that only helping a charity can provide.

I wouldn’t be surprised if this list is not all inclusive, so please leave a comment with a link if you know of any I missed! There’s no browsing mechanism so I was just searching on terms like “thorougbred”, “racehorse” “jockey” “backstretch” etc to see what I could find. While not specifically racing related, I also gave one of my votes to Wikimedia, aka Wikipedia as without Wikipedia I would know a lot less about racing and it’s history.

So, here’s the list… the name of charity links to the page in Facebook to vote for it. I’ve also included a link to the charity’s website where available. If you have a racing charity and are not yet participating, get over and sign up! And then let me know about it so I can add it here.

AC4H
website

Backstretch Clubhouse
more info

Backstretch Education Fund Inc
website

Backstretch Employee Service Team Of New York Inc (BEST)
website

CANTER (IL)
website

CANTER (OH)
website

CANTER (MI)
website

CANTER (NE)
website

CANTER (PA)
website

Disabled Jockey Endowment

Don Macbeth Memorial Jockey Fund
website

Exceller Fund
website

Florida Thoroughbred Charities Inc
website

Friends of Ferdinand
website

Grayson Jockey Club Research Foundation
website

Illinois Equine Humane Center
website

New England Thoroughbred Retirement Center
website

New Vocations Racehorse Adoption
website

Old Friends
website

Permanently Disabled Jockey’s Fund
website

Racehorse Redemption Inc
more info

ReRun
website

Thoroughbred Charities of America
website

Thoroughbred Rehab Center
more info

Thoroughbred Retirement Center
website

Washington Thoroughbred Foundation
more info

Posted by dana on Dec 06 2009    
Filed Under: Internet, Impressive, 2009, :), You Can Help, Retirement, Rescue, Research, Racing

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(yausser)

Not old enough to know what a test pattern is? look it up, rotten kids!

Things have been a little busy around GbG manor lately. So, until I’m able to resume my somewhat regular posting habits, I offer a few tidbits, random brief thoughts and suggestions. Basically, an enhanced test pattern.

Mirroring current events, but worse! Racing offers the opposite of stimulus package.

In mainstream media madness, I’m not sure I agree but I hope he’s right!

On the Derby trail, or perhaps off… I think Saratoga Sinner’s injury will give him a better chance to turn into a nice horse… thanks universe!

And thanks for pointing this out, now I can’t not notice!

Wanna help some horses? Put your money where your pie hole is, go make a donation!

HANA has been releasing their handy and helpful top 20 track rating… currently on #9 working towards #1, think of them as the Consumer Reports for horseplayers. Bloodhorse is also helpfully posting numbers 1-10.

Rock On! GbG pal & regular photog Sarah K. Andrew has a fun series running on her blog featuring racing folks and their top ten album series. So far there’s GbG regular photog Bud, the excellent Bill Finely and in what has to be the best racing photo ever, Barbara Livingston doubling as a member of the Sleaze Sisters from the movie Times Square (oh, if she only had that sound track in her list). Full disclosure, my top 10 list will be published over there once I find a sufficiently embarrassing photo.

Need more proof that working in an office sucks? Watch minutes 2:44 to the end. Note: if you already hate working in an office, don’t watch this part. When it’s 2:30 and you’re stuck in a meeting, you’ll really be kicking yourself. The sound of jets in the background when Zenyatta is running is also pretty appropriate, even if it’s only a jog:

And finally, a Public Service Announcement: Let’s just keep this in mind if Stardom Bound does not devour her competition this weekend in the Las Virgenes:

Posted by dana on Feb 04 2009    
Filed Under: Zenyatta, Industry, Bud Morton, Racing History, Stardom Bound, 2009, Mainstream Media, Sarah K. Andrew, Derby Trail, Rescue, Race Replay, You Can Help, YouTube, 3yo, Racing

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