There is no other mainstream sport where carnage and indifference occur so regularly – and are as tolerated
I was 18 when I first saw a racehorse break down. It was the late 1990s and I was an exercise rider galloping horses at Del Mar racetrack, the Pacific Ocean glistening in the distance. Seared into my memory is the image of a petite dark bay horse on the inside rail just by the wire in the bleached light of a southern California morning. The rider, who had escaped injury, stood tugging at the reins fighting to keep the horse still. The horse had suffered a clean break of the right front ankle and his foot dangled and swung from the bottom of his leg. He turned and staggered on the stump in panic – euthanasia would soon follow. I averted my eyes and felt instantly sick as I jogged my filly by, the siren that blares across the backside when there is an accident ringing through my head. At that time I could not have known it would be the first of many such scenes I would see over the years of my life on the track.
Decades later the deaths roll on. Seven racehorses lost their lives in the days leading up to this year’s Kentucky Derby. Four breakdowns, a broken neck in the paddock, and two yet-to-be-explained collapses paint a grim picture of horse racing in America.
