Day 29

The Winter continues... Turfway cancelled meaning Makutus won't be getting a chance to run today. On one hand I wasn't looking forward to spending much time at Turfway today but the race looked like it was very winnable. We are doing some in-barn training since the area surrounding the barn remains a sheet of ice. The farm also remains pretty much shut down without power and too cold to do much other than walk the horses. Very frustrating to say the least.

There is an industry-wide debate brewing as a result of Andy Beyer's recent article concerning dramatic form reversals and the role of the "supertrainer". One side is is firmly entrenched in the Beyer camp feeling that "supertrainers" are almost certainly doing illegal things to win at unusually high rates and getting amazing results from seemingly ordinary horses. The opposing view is that the game has changed and that these guys are playing the new version better than everyone else is. I have to say that I can see why people would be on board with Beyer not only because of his points which are solid but because the lack of historical precedent for these feats. I can also see where the dissenting view is that there isn't a whole lot of evidence that isn't circumstantial to point the finger at these guys. The truth is that both sides have valid points and virtually no one has a real grasp on the situation including those who are supposedly in charge of policing the sport.

I believe that most if not all of the guys with ridiculous win percentages and a history of form reversals are not on the level. The sport is littered with examples of trainers (and jockeys) gaining an advantage by illegal means and there is no reason to believe that this is any different now. If you were able to use lasix in the early 70's without detection don't you think that as a trainer you would have a huge advantage? Well that happened didn't it? What is the lasix of today? It doesn't have to be some exotic, nefarious drug made by some evil doctor. It might be a medication that has been around for a while that is delivered via feed supplement and fed orally. It may be an experimental drug that has not even been released yet. It may be an undetectable steroid. It may be any number of things. But I guarantee that there is something. 

Naturally these substances will never be found unless the authorities get extremely lucky and banning of all drugs like foreign jurisdictions will have no effect on these. As a matter of fact some of the best performance enhancers come from overseas. A very successful trainer of recent years on the NY, FL, KY circuit has been boosted from a pretty ordinary guy to a supertrainer at the top of the sport via Australian "hop" that was delivered orally (without the need for a vet). A huge owner/trainer claiming operation that had tremendous nationwide success was using Celebrex on its runners the morning of the race without detection. This was at the same time said drug was being advertised widely on television, hardly a designer drug. One of the trainers under suspicion spends lots of time in body building gyms which are hotbeds of performance enhancing drugs. Another came out firing at unusually high percentages yet worked for an outfit for years that had never hit more than 15%. Another recent phenom regularly uses shockwave therapy (which in itself is not illegal) but doesn't bother paying attention to the guidelines which say that you cant race within 7 or 10 days of treatment.

The idea that these guys "read the condition book better" than the other trainers or are somehow superior poker players is ludicrous. First off the condition books of today's racing secretaries are fairly simple and widely available. The claim and drop method that is used by some high percentage trainers is much more effective due to the fact that the other trainers will rarely claim off these guys because the horses they touch often turn from gold to wood when they leave their barn. The use of this defense is mitigated by the fact that it is actually an implication as well. How do they explain the sudden form reversals both coming into the supertrainers barns and even more importantly leaving them? 

Our society is one with a win at all costs regardless of the collatoral damage that occurs attitude. That perfectly explains the "supertrainer' and those which support them , including and probably especially the owners who feed them horses. I know many of these guys personally, know those which have worked for them and watched their methods. There just isn't that much difference between what they do and what many other competent trainers do. In every walk of life there are people who are exceptional at their profession, those who are merely good and those who aren't very good. "Supertrainers" ARE too good to be true, just like hitting 73 home runs at the age of 37 was.