Let's jump right in on an issue that pisses everyone off: Drugs in the show ring.
I'm not talking about bute and a little banamine to combat travel stiffness or the odd pulled muscle. I'm talking about using drugs that alter the performance of the horse, like acetazolimide, lasix, reserpine, and narcotics.
How can horse organizations keep approving drugs that alter a horse's performance?
How can trainers that have multiple drug suspensions continue to show and make big money?
Why do peope entrust their horses to trainers that have been busted?
When exactly did our horse organizations, which are supposed to police and protect the horse world, become drug enablers for shitty trainers and breeders that produce genetic defects?
I'm not talking about bute and a little banamine to combat travel stiffness or the odd pulled muscle. I'm talking about using drugs that alter the performance of the horse, like acetazolimide, lasix, reserpine, and narcotics.
How can horse organizations keep approving drugs that alter a horse's performance?
How can trainers that have multiple drug suspensions continue to show and make big money?
Why do peope entrust their horses to trainers that have been busted?
When exactly did our horse organizations, which are supposed to police and protect the horse world, become drug enablers for shitty trainers and breeders that produce genetic defects?
11 comments:
Hey, another spot for me to bitch. Good blog! Lots of material here.
< How can horse organizations keep approving drugs that alter a horse's performance? >
Passive neglect, or at least that's what I'm seeing with ace and other tranquilizers in the NRHA. There's no drug rule in the NRHA and last time I checked there still wasn't one. It's the end result of all the futurities. I love reining and thought to join the NRHA but may just stick to open shows and piss people off with my non-drugged MULE.
Drug testing is too sporadic and it's hard to pick which one to test when every damn horse looks drugged. Oooh, maybe they'd have to throw everyone out, that would be terrible!
< How can trainers that have multiple drug suspensions continue to show and make big money? >
It's all in a name. I keep touch with some fairly decent trainers but there's all kinds of shit out there. They can run a horse dead in the warmup pen but if they win in the show ring people will line up to get in that person's show barn. Judges also can be bought off- everyone likes to think it doesn't happen but it does.
< Why do peope entrust their horses to trainers that have been busted? >
See above- all in a name. I was utterly horrifed at an open show by some western pleasure chick sawing on her horse's mouth and digging into his sides, and she had 3 or 4 clients that just rode on by with her grinding and pulling at that horse with no emotion whatsoever, like she was reading a newspaper.
Drugs are the crutch of the incompetant and ignorant.
Trainers get away with it because people want to win, no matter what cost, even if it cripples or kills their horse.
It truly is the disgrace of the horse industry. Western showing, like baseball, is an American sport. And like baseball it has becomea bastion of drugging and poor training practices.
I would NEVER send my horse to, nor buy a horse from, a trainer that had a drug suspension. I don't care how famous they are, if they are that ethically challenged they aren't handling my horse.
Tracy Meisenbach
www.trinityapp.com
http://thehorsediary.blogspot.com/ (updated 4-30-2008)
Drugs ARE a shortcut to real training!
Can't keep your horse under control, give it some Acetazolimide, that will make it lethargic enough to enter the ring.
Can't run the barrels w/o your horse bleeding, give it some lasix, that will dehydrate it and contract the vessels. Who knows what daily repeated use will do to the horse, that is unstudied.
Can't get your horse to perform his sliding stops or spins, give him some hock injections, but make sure you do it before you enter the show grounds, they have rules you know!
Can't make your Western Pleasure horse perform without him slapping his tail around ('cause he is unhappy about how he has to move), give him some tail deadening shots in his spine and then cover up his hamburger meat tail with an "appliance" (fake tail) so he appears to be happy! Then clean up his butt for a week!
Personally, I think the Stock Horse Industry has gotten away with far more abusive treatment of the horse than some of the other breeds, 'cept maybe the TWH, but they are at least making an attempt to clean up their act!
Carrie Giannandrea
Dances with Horses
Formula One Farms
I'm already laughing at the responses from some of the yahoo lists.
All of us anti-drug people are just sour grapers! We don't really "understand" the show system.
What a joke. The drug users just can't admit that they suck as trainers, and their defective horses can't cut it in the ring without their chemical fixes.
Maybe there should be a list of trainers that have been busted for drugging posted on the internet in a prominent place. That way people could see what a bunch of sorry asses they are.
"Maybe there should be a list of trainers that have been busted for drugging posted on the internet in a prominent place. That way people could see what a bunch of sorry asses they are.
Trojan Mouse.......this is a great idea, I will do it! Would anyone like to start me with some names?
I will post it on my Website and My drug page........does not bother me to do this.....if it can save some horses from cruel and unusual treatment at the end of a needle, I am game!
Carrie Giannandrea
Dances with Horses
Formula One Farms
Carrie,
I'm willing to start gathering them up. If anyone else has a verifiable suspension for durgs, meaning I can call the organization and they will tell me that person has been suspended, then send it to me and I will work up the list.
It's obvious that the people in charge of the horse organizations have no interest in cleaning up the industry, so it looks like the little people will have to.
A blog after my own heart. Got out of the "big time" because it made me sick what those barns expected you to do to make those horses conform.
What the hell ever happened to realizing that a horse should be trained to do an event that is to his advantage not forced/drugged into doing what some jerk paid for him to do??
when i see the long lists of drugs that most breed organizations allow i always think of what bad advertsing it is for that breed.
i looked at the aqha rulebook online and can only think that those horses must have tons of soundness issues. most of the drugs aren't about maintenance, they are about covering up problems. it's not horse aspirin, it's horse heroin.
trainers that use drugs should be shunned out of the business. i can't imagine how a parent lets a child ride with a drug using trainer.
I'm willing to start gathering them up. If anyone else has a verifiable suspension for durgs, meaning I can call the organization and they will tell me that person has been suspended, then send it to me and I will work up the list.
Trojan Mouse........I will work at gathering names and their infractions too.......anyone else who would like to contribute Trainers with Drug Violations, you are more than welcome to send me names!
Carrie Giannandrea
Dances with Horses
Formula One Farms
Have a great new trainer locally. He loved my mare so much he didn't want to give her back. No buck, loads of go, natural headset and all in a snaffle. Best thing since sliced bread!
Not a spot
Trainer Bill Boniface has been suspended 15 days after one of his horses tested positive for metabolites of cocaine following a race at Pimlico
The New Mexico Racing Commission has suspended trainer Joe Meyers for five years after he was accused of stuffing a sponge into a horse's nostrils
Trainer Patrick Biancone, suspended for one year for possessing on the grounds of Keeneland three sealed vials of alpha-cobratoxin (cobra venom)
Trainer Gary Contessa was suspended 20 days and fined $5000 after eight horses in his care tested positive for ephedrin.
Trainer Ken Rucker's horse Highland Pride A, which won the eighth race at the Meadowlands on April 30, tested positive for erythropoietin, or EPO, a banned performance enhancer.
Steve Asmussen's horses have tested positive for drugs twenty-two times in his career, including the following drugs: Clen Buterol (Ventipulmin), Ketorolec, Mepivicaine, and acepromazine.
Top quarter horse trainer John Bassett is banned from racing in New Mexico for 45 days because a horse in his stable tested positive for cocaine last summer.
In 2001, a horse trained by Robert Belcher tested positive, post-race, at an
Ohio race track for a morphine derivative drug
Horse trainer Richard Violette Jr is suspended and fined after banned substance Robaxin is found in horse Flying Sharp
Now, in the horse racing industry, since the almighty $$ is so important, these folks get press ink and they will list who, what and why.
Guess in the lowly $$ Horse Show Industry......we folks who are looking for trainers don't need to know that stuff.
Carrie Giannandrea
Dances with Horses
Formula One Farms
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