Allday Music

[girly]

Scandals sometimes are just what creates the public outcry that can lead to positive change! What is needed is a stand up guy with a good reputation to be the whistle blower- some one who finally has enough. It can be so unpleasant, but it\'s amazing how fast regulations/laws can get through the legislature after a good scandal!

[BitPlayer]

TGJB -

I think asking a regulatory agency to publish TCO2 results in any comprehensible way may be fruitless.  I was asking about their willingness to provide it, whether under compulsion of a Freedom of Information request or otherwise.  Have you asked that question?

Once the raw data has been made available, someone else can analyze it and publish their analysis.

That said, suppose you identify five trainers whose horses consistently come in well above average but just below the threshold.  What do you do then?

[TGJB]

I identify trainers that move horses up, I would love to have the data to correlate with mine.

Doubt anyone has tried Freedom of Information. Interesting idea.

[Silver Charm]

\"That said, suppose you identify five trainers whose horses consistently come in well above average but just below the threshold. What do you do then?\"

Start betting on them.

[rosewood]

This is exactly some of the information the owners and whales do not want anyone except themselves to have.

This is information that everyone on this board wants equal access to and are labeled as Morons and conspiracy idiots to even question the status quo.

It would not take long if some of the multi-million dollar babies were removed from the track and labeled as a chemically enhanced sire prospect to get a lot of people finding Jesus all of a sudden.

[richiebee]

TGJB:

Yes I am following.

Of course the most effective cheaters are the ones who rarely if ever get
caught. These cheaters have the resources to stay at least one step ahead of
a Racing establishment which is not wholly committed to catching and punishing
them anyway.

Chuckles can be a loose cannon, but the glare from his errant shells sometimes
illuminates the real target; that being said, I, like others, do not think that
this board or any other medium should be used for character assassinations
which are not at least partially grounded in fact. I know I sound quite naive
in my responses to CTC, but I am merely trying to point out to CTC that the
scientific method-- collection and analysis of facts-- while not as
entertaining as rhetorical diatribes, certainly will bring us all closer to the
truth.

As today\'s exchanges on the board demonstrate, there is certainly a lot of data
which is being collected, even if it is not widely distributed. And as Rosewood
says there are powerful influences which probably want as little of this
information as possible to see the light of day.

You are in tough spot, Jerry, because you have access to a lot of potentially
enlightening information, and many times you have wistfully said \"I wish
someone would subpoena me\", because the truth is that coming forward
voluntarily is probably not in your best interest from a commercial point of
view.

On a lighter note, is the TG production crew working on a way to fit the CO2
levels on to the graph? Maybe you could market this as TG \"plus\"? If this is
an original idea I want a discount.

[TGJB]

Richie-- I told the powers-that-be that I would be doing exactly that if the results were ever published. Not on the graph, left side of the page.

[sighthound]

BitPlayer Wrote:
>>I did a little
> Google search of my own and found a PDF of a
> PowerPoint presentation for stewards and other
> racing officials on the University of Louisville
> website:
>
> http://cobweb2.louisville.edu/eip/Steward_Schools/
> Medical2007.pdf
>
> TCO2 testing is discussed on pages 39-44.


That is an excellent overview, great find.  I highly recommend that everyone here who has an interest read the TCO2 pages, and flip through the rest of it (you can skip the scientific testing detail).

Please note the number of positives obtained during a measured period of recent California testing.

People who think the entire sport is corrupt and that all horses are drugged will be sorely disappointed by the low numbers of positives - for both TCO2 and other drug overages.

>>The
> information provided includes an analysis of test
> results from 2006 at Hollywood Park.  It seems
> pretty clear from that info and the links you
> posted that (a) everyone knows some trainers are
> gaming the system and (b) there\'s too much
> innocent variability in TCO2 levels to completely
> stop them.  Do you know whether detention barns
> are an effective remedy?

See the above powerpoint presentation:  it discusses trainers that routinely came back very high, what was done about them, split testing, and detention barn use to change results (successfully) for the few bad guys.

One thing nobody here has mentioned, and I\'m surprised, as there has to be some horsemen on this board - and this is regarding \"gaming the system\":

A good, educated trainer uses mild alkalinyzing agents, electrolytes, dietary supplements, specific diets, herbal supplements, etc, on a daily basis.  Why?

Because it helps the horse.  That daily dose of alkalinyzing agent prevents muscle soreness and extra days off, it prevents tying-up (exertional rhabdomyolysis), and it optimizes performance.

Is it cheating for a trainer to have his horses run TCO2 levels of 34-35 every day?  Or good, educated, state-of-the-art horsemanship?

The question for me is:  how does it enhance the performance of the horse (in relation to the betting publics money).

So how much of a performance improvement can a horse running TCO2 levels of 34-35 have versus if his normal is 32-33?

But then:  what about the trainer who feeds a better protein-carbohydrate-fat ration?  The trainer who adds vitamin-mineral-micronutrient supplements to enhance red blood cell numbers?  

This trainers horses are going to run noticably and measurably better, too.  Diet alone can move a horse up measurably in lengths and endurance.

Are these trainers cheaters?

Is it good training formulated as a result of all we have learned scientifically about optimizing the performance of racing or jumping equines?

What the veterinary community has recommended to those that train athletic horses based upon what we have learned over the last 30 years?

Some have already decided all trainers who have numbers over 31mM/L for TCO2 are cheaters, and the higher the number, the more of a cheater they are.

There is a fine line between being an excellent, knowledgable horse trainer, and \"cheating\" - it is not always measureable \"by the numbers\", and as black and white, as some may think.

[sighthound]

> There should be a weekly list printed in every
> print racing publication of all positives across
> the country.  It should be on their websites.  Why
> doesn\'t anyone stand up?

Street, Kentucky and California both publish theirs, and keep it relatively current.

Edit:  here is Kentucky:

http://www.khra.ky.gov/stewardsjudgesrulings/

Here is California - search on stewards and year

http://www.chrb.ca.gov

And, here is New York:

http://rulings.racing.state.ny.us/frm_Rulings.aspx

[BitPlayer]

Sighthound -

Point well taken.  I considered changing the words \"gaming the system\" to something less prejudicial, but couldn\'t find an apt alternative.

As I read some of the web pages you linked to, I thought about the things I tried to get my marathon time down far enough to qualify for Boston.  The carbo loading would probably pass muster, but the coffee 30 minutes before race time and the Gatorade on the course (while clearly acceptable in the running community at the time) would probably not pass muster under a \"hay, oats, and water on race day\" regime.

I confess to having little knowledge of either veterinary medicine or medication rules.  Do you know if trainers would generally have to violate some rule in order to get achieve 34-35 mM TCO2 on race day?  I read quickly through the NYRA medication rules you linked to.  While milkshakes are clearly illegal, it wasn\'t clear to me whether the \"mild alkalizing agents\" you suggest would also be prohibited.  It is hard to argue against enlightened treatment of the equine athlete, but is also hard to justify looking the other way while some trainers grab an edge that is forbidden to their law-abiding brethren.

[Street Sense]

sighthound Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> > There should be a weekly list printed in every
> > print racing publication of all positives
> across
> > the country.  It should be on their websites.
> Why
> > doesn\'t anyone stand up?
>
> Street, Kentucky and California both publish
> theirs, and keep it relatively current.
>
> Edit:  here is Kentucky:
>
> http://www.khra.ky.gov/stewardsjudgesrulings/
>
> Here is California - search on stewards and year
>
> http://www.chrb.ca.gov
>
> And, here is New York:
>
> http://rulings.racing.state.ny.us/frm_Rulings.aspx


Thanks, Sighthound.  That\'s a start.  Now if the BloodHorse or other print publication would print those violations along with the violations in the other 40 or however many other jurisdictions we\'d have a good thing going.

[sighthound]

>The carbo loading would probably pass
> muster, but the coffee 30 minutes before race time
> and the Gatorade on the course (while clearly
> acceptable in the running community at the time)
> would probably not pass muster under a \"hay, oats,
> and water on race day\" regime.

Good analogy.  I would hate to be you at 18 miles, on a 70-degree day, with only water as a rehydrator, though!

>>Do you
> know if trainers would generally have to violate
> some rule in order to get achieve 34-35 mM TCO2 on
> race day?  

I think you have to pre-race test repeated horses from a trainers barn, to see what he averages out as.  That\'s hopefully what the split-retest will tell you after a positive.  34 is pretty easy to hit with \"good husbandry\" and a high lasix dose.

Some trainers have their own TCO2 levels run on their barns, to see where their individual \"practices\" (be it well-intentioned, or not) make their horses fall.

Standardbreds in Illinois used to have a 35 level, I believe, and they had to raise it, too many non-administered positives from diet, lasix, etc.

But intent doesn\'t really matter, does it, if the guy with the veterinary nutritionist and the guy with a cheap diet but a handful of baking soda/potassium citrate capsules both have horses coming in at 35-36?  If it is known (and it isn\'t, for sure in a regularly predictable way) that moves up most horses one length?  

Where do you draw the line here?  Right now it\'s at 37 or 39, depending on the jurisdiction.  Because the only way to get that high is to deliberately add.

>>While milkshakes
> are clearly illegal, it wasn\'t clear to me whether
> the \"mild alkalizing agents\" you suggest would
> also be prohibited.

Not if they don\'t go over the levels allowed.  Sure, some trainers have been over, and they\'ve not \"milkshaked\" a thing, and they were shocked at being accused - but the horse had still ingested it (more common when they started TCO2 testing on a regular basis, trainers learning what things can affect levels).

It\'s like bute and lasix - you can have \"so much\", but not more.  Trainers have had inadvertent positives using herbal and \"natural\" stuff too, as you often don\'t know exactly what is in there.

Alot of these allowable levels are established by \"best guestimate\", not any rigorous scientific examination.  That is being worked upon for many substances.

[shanahan]

just looked at the CHRB site...no Jeff Mullins or Baffert..surprised.  In any case, Doug Oneill had a $3K fine (negotiated settlement) for somehting called \"insure condition of horse\"...anyone know what that means?

the list is a real \"who\'s who\"...

[Chuckles_the_Clown2]

richie wrote:

\"Chuckles can be a loose cannon, but the glare from his errant shells sometimes
illuminates the real target; that being said, I, like others, do not think that
this board or any other medium should be used for character assassinations
which are not at least partially grounded in fact. I know I sound quite naive
in my responses to CTC, but I am merely trying to point out to CTC that the
scientific method-- collection and analysis of facts-- while not as
entertaining as rhetorical diatribes, certainly will bring us all closer to the
truth.\"

I know you want the statistical data on the jump ups. Sometime ago, I abandoned making my own data. I\'ve gotten to a point where I can review a card with past races as a reference and at a glance, in mere seconds, score the race out, considering time and the days card and even factoring wide (where relevant) and weight. I don\'t purport that its highly accurate, but ambiguity is resolved here for the next race. It does however free me up to launch errant cannon shells and/or focus upon other aspects of reviewing a card. If you don\'t know from the data here that Lawyer Ron jumped 4 points under Plech, I can\'t help you. (I actually make the jump 5 points and have it sustained in the following race.) With that horses iron horse history that improvement was utter unadulterated b.s. and if thats an errant cannon shell you\'re a Palestinian.

The Carbs are only part of the equation. Theres some disagreement upon how big a part. I think the Carb situation has one very important feature though. It will illustrate who is cheating and then they can look more closely into how they are cheating irregardless of carbs. In some places they already are.

[TGJB]

Wrong. Giving alkalyzing agents IS prohibited, they just don\'t give out sanctions unless the levels pass a certain threshold. This is done to keep the tracks out of court, obviously not to protect the bettor.

I mean, it must have occurred to you that trainers can run their horses hot and cold, right? Would you be okay with not announcing which horses are running on Lasix, and trainers putting them on and off it without the public knowing?

And by the way, the difference looks like about 4 points, or 5 lengths at 6 furlongs. In some cases (see a certain Mid-Atlantic trainer) it is much more, but he might be using something else as well, like raceday Clenbuterol (injected).