:(

[the_wanlorn]

Oh Eight Belles, you were so pretty and nice and now you are dead.

This is one of the reasons horse racing makes me slightly uncomfortable. (As opposed to the reasons it makes me hugely uncomfortable). How often does this happen? :( Too often man, too often. :(

Comments

[shoiryu.livejournal.com]

Jesus Christ. At lunch I was just telling my non-horsey bff about Barbaro and then this shit happens again? Jesus.

[the-wanlorn.livejournal.com]

Seriously. And really, the only reason why we're hearing about these ones is because they were really good horses that won/almost won. I'd stake my life on it happening a lot more than we hear.

[shoiryu.livejournal.com]

IMO Fugly Horse is onto something with the riding the yearlings into the ground thing. Young animals need time to develop before they can push so hard, you know?

[the-wanlorn.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah. That's the main reason I'm majorly uncomfortable with horse racing. I mean, if you tried to pull that shit with sled dogs you'd be shunned by the community*. And dogs develop far more quickly than horses.

It's just ridiculous.



* By "that shit" I mean working yearlings that hard. While most sled dogs start "training" when they're 8 or 9 months old, that basically means running free alongside an older team or being harnessed to the sled for short distances but not actually pulling any weight (the experienced dogs do the pulling). They don't pull weight (which, I believe, is comperable to a horse carrying weight) until after the skeleton fully develops, which takes over a year.

[darth-cabal.livejournal.com]

Yeah, a horse doesn't really reach racing prime until five, but in recent times there's been a push to start racing as early as possible in order to maximize breeding years (which are where the real profit for a good stallion comes in). Most horses have stopped racing by the time they hit their prime.