Steve assmussen

[Miesque]

Link

It's all going a bit tits up in America....

[Aragorn]

That is a difficult video to watch. Made me feel a bit ill to be honest.

[Grey]

That looks bad, Miesque.

Does the Asmussen stable have a particular reputation?

[BennyB]

There are some undoubtedly shocking and distasteful things in the film. However...

PETA is a shoddy organisation and the axe they are grinding does threaten to devalue any legitimate point they try to make. How shocking, a trainer of a bad horse is pleased it's been claimed! How disgraceful, stable lads don't get paid much! Reminds me of the pathetic "charity" that is the RSPCA - spending 250k of donations prosecuting someone for maybe chasing a fox.


These daft points detract from the main issue that American racing isn't a particularly nice business.

I've been involved with UK racing on some level or other for a couple of decades and I have to say that 95% of people I've encountered love and respect horses. Does anyone have any tales of the ilk depicted in the PETA video about UK racing?


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[icebreaker]

I despise PETA, but it's hard to defend the (American) industry against the accusations and revelations in the video.
Maybe in this instance, PETA have done a favour for common decency. The dogs in the street having been barking the malaise in U.S. racing for years. This video makes visible the elephant in the room as far as U.S. racing is concerned. There is a culture of look-the-other-way in American racing, decades of mistreatment and disregard for the horses, endemic cheating via the use of performance-enhancing drugs.
If these practices are the regular norm in the winningmost set-up in the country -- Asmussen's -- then how many dime operation barns are also at blame?

I really fear this video and report could do serious damage to the American industry, if not even mortally wound it. The New York Times is carrying the story as is most of the mainstream TV news channels. The broad public gets emotional about stuff like this, and will see the horseracing game as a cesspool of cruelty. Some big owners will want out rather than be associated with the public excoriation that is bound to follow. ( And no owner, I imagine, likes being called a c**t by an assistant trainer who he is paying wages to). Some high-rolling players of an ethical bent will stay away from the Tote windows and instead make their bets in some other sport.

Okay, except for the buzzers, none of the things portrayed in the video are stictly illegal. Lasix is legal, tapping a joint is legal, running a horse that isn't 100% is legal, ........................ but it is the overall disregard for animal welfare and the uncaring attitude of the stable that leaves a sour taste in the mouth.

[BigTea]

PETA have obviously exaggerated some points but American racing is a cruel business. Horses running too often and that video is quite shocking, that stable is a disgrace


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[icebreaker]

Some big owners will want out rather than be associated with the public excoriation that is bound to follow. ( And no owner, I imagine, likes being called a c**t by an assistant trainer who he is paying wages to).

I notice this very thing starting to happen now.
Ray Paulick ( former editor of Blood Horse ) reports: "Zayat Stable will scratch its horses trained by Steve Asmussen from this weekend’s races".

And on Twitter Ahmet Zayat himself tweets:
"if True they will be fired period. Need to get facts. Its people life reputation and lifehood no one love nehro more then me"

and

"that is screwed up. Maybe it's time for me to exit this sport #toomuch crooks "

https://twitter.com/jazz3162


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[Miesque]

I didn't give my reaction as I wanted to see how the video was perceived here first.

There is nothing illegal shown in the care of the horses. At all. The only illegal thing is the workers/IRS dodging.

The injections are all standard maintenance. The scope is shown as something awful, not a standard pre race health check. Some of the drugs shown are wormers for goodness sake! The video is very skewed, it sounds like Nehro ran every week - in reality he ran barely into double figures over three years and had eight month plus layoffs. how they think his feet were linked to colic I don't know?!

The worst bit is the complete taking out of context of the "machine" /shocker comments - it was a conversation about their early days at unlicensed QH bush tracks!

[icebreaker]

The only illegal thing is the workers/IRS dodging.

Buzzers are illegal whether it is at "New Mexico Bush Downs" or Saratoga Springs.
Geary Louviere was banned for life for using the device at Balmoral.

Please do not allow yourself to adopt an ostrich head-in-the-sand outlook. This is a most serious issue that must be addressed. Very serious stuff that will have long-lasting consequences for the sport in the U.S.
Unfortunately, it might be too late now after these highly public revelations, to recoup public goodwill.

[Miesque]

Oh, they are absolutely illegal no matter where used but the conversation was about something that happened 15 years ago. The editing to convey it as an everyday usage now is what I take issue with.

[icebreaker]

Blasi has been fired from his asst-trainer job.
http://www.drf.com/news/blasi-fired-...mplaints-video
Proper order too. The man is a disgrace.
But Asmussen should fall on his sword as well, imho. Anything less just looks like a damage limitation exercise. The buck only stops with the man at the top.

[edgt]

Is the misspelt surname a freudian slip or what ?

[Miesque]

Is the misspelt surname a freudian slip or what ?

It's what my iPad autocrrects to.

http://blogs.courier-journal.com/rac...time-employer/

An interesting view from Maggi Moss who is famous in the USA for rehoming her ex racers.

[trudij]

What I think of PETA would get me banned from the internet, not just from here. Have to say that while it shouldn't happen and clearly there are things that need investigating and dealing with properly, I agree with her regarding the amount of footage they must have and that there is only 8 minutes of stuff in the video.

As for the drugs they show - as miesque says above, there's a wormer and some sedative there in the pictures that flash through, and no indication that many of the ones in that part of the film were being used wrongly - the whole video IMO is showing up both sides badly.


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[jinnyj]

Well firstly its in the Huffington Post (which I think is second only to the National Enquirer as a rag paper).

Secondly, this wasn't an interview done in public - this was covert filming. Sure the assistant is an ar*e but speak to plenty of people in yards in this country and that's how they will come across. With regard to the way he spoke about the owner - that was in private and I'm sure we call plenty of people we work with/for "c*nts" if for whatever reason we don't see eye to eye with them. This was not meant for national broadcasting. Not that I'm defending him as a person (I wouldn't have employed him in the first place!)

The whole racing game in the US with regard to owners/trainers differs from over here. Because they pretty much all train together, your owners wander around and there are plenty of other trainers chatting them up to get your nice horse off you. I worked for a trainer who had trained a horse to win over $1m as a 2yo. He was 2nd in his prep run then 2nd again in the Kentucky Derby under a pretty ordinary ride. (He flopped in the Preakness which horses often do due to Pimlico being a strange track) He then just got beat against a decent older horse giving him stacks of weight. Gary Jones the trainer was breathing down this owner's neck the whole time - even sent a spy to work for us to see how he could trip us up. And the horse duly moved where he continued to be a good horse despite the fact my boss had done nothing wrong and ironically as a cheap Cal-bred yearling, none of the owners trainers had wanted him as a yearling, Jones included. So the pressure over there is huge for a trainer - he has to keep performing and many will take the "assisted route" - its not right in my opinion but if you have an owner saying "when's my horse going to win...." they may take every route available and that includes performance enhancers.

As Miesque says, none of the drugs used are wrong. And I feel that injecting joints especially hocks is necessary and hugely beneficial in many cases. Hell we don't complain when a footballer needs a cortico-steroidal injection so why the problem when its used on a horse? I do object to the multi-use of Lasix regardless and also Thyroxine when it is obviously used as a performance enhancer.

Asmussen has a tall reputation as a "needle-man" and has been reprimanded on many occasions. My bet is that his horses are tested post-race more than most. I'm guessing though this video is a fraction of what possibly does go on in the barn. And don't for a second think that what's in the video doesn't go on in this country - I could tell you any number of trainers regularly over-using medications.

Incidentally in the US, you put your claim in for a horse BEFORE the race (not like over here where it is afterwards), so you do need to do your homework on any potential claim or you could be claiming one with dodgy legs. My boss claimed one which came back on 3 legs with a stress fracture and the grooms all said "Boss, we told you not that one!"

So all in all its meant to shock but if you work in the industry, its not nearly as bad as its made out to be. (well except for the buzzers - that's not good but there again - in this country............)

[icebreaker]

As for the drugs they show - as miesque says above, there's a wormer and some sedative there in the pictures that flash through,

What about the Thyroxine ?
It seems every single horse in Asmussen's care was getting it. That alone is veterinary malpractice; it should only be administered to a horse with hypothyroidism -- otherwise it can cause metabolic meltdown in a healthy horse.
What about all the other performance enhancing drugs and pain-maskers being injected into the horses. And it's not as if Asmussen doesn't have a lot of "previous" for this sort of thing going back many many years.

Regarding the length of the video. Of course it had to be edited down to a shortish cut to enable it to get public showing on the networks and media. Who is going to sit through an eight-hour film of it.
The story here is not PETA, anyone who tries to convince themselves that it is, is wearing blinkers. The story is the disgraceful abuse of horses in the Asmussen barn. Every damning admission in the vid came out of the mouth of Blasi. No editing was needed to fake what he said.

[trudij]

I was watching on my phone Ice, hence I couldn't remember the other bottles that whizzed
through the screen, and it is too small to pick bits out. There are lots of injections that get given to horses at all kinds of times - in any one day at work I will be holding ketamine, somulose and trancemic acid (sp!) but it doesn't follow that I will be injecting horses with it there and then!
I also don't know what the American rules are regarding drugs - so I can't comment on the rights and wrongs of individual drugs.

As Kirsty says, there's nothing wrong with horses getting joint injections - they happen to hundreds of horses every day of the week all over the country, so I don't for one second believe they don't happen elsewhere. Especially if the rules allow it. It's like the European horses running on Lasix when they go over to the USA - they are potentially at a disadvantage if they don't, and it's in the rules - so most of them get it. Doesn't make it right, I am of the opinion that horses shouldn't be on any drugs at all when they run - but that doesn't make me any more correct than someone who says it's ok.

The problem with it being PETA is that it dilutes everything they are trying to do just becuse they are so ridiculously blinkered about their views. If they had their way there would be no racing, no shows, no animals kept as pets and as for things like your favourite coursing - that will be gone before you can say "steroid joint injection"
They lose all credibility in my eyes just by being so venemous about everything. Their way or you're wrong is not the way to get respect, and the amount of doctoring to suit themselves is unacceptable.

It's a shame really, becuse I have a lot of sympathy with the stance on animal testing (of toiletries and make up) and transportation - but I cannot take them seriously.

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[icebreaker]

As Kirsty says, there's nothing wrong with horses getting joint injections -

Oh, I do agree with that .
But there is plenty wrong giving Thyroxine to a horse that doesn't require it -- giving it to every horse in the barn just to increase the heart rate. It's like giving levothyroxine to a human athlete to make him run faster, and likely causing long-term and irreversible damage to his metabolism. It's malpractice.

[trudij]

As I said above - I don't know the rules about drugs in the USA - it could well be that they don't have an issue with it over there, there are lots of things that European vets don't have the same views on!!


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[icebreaker]

The problem with it being PETA is that it dilutes everything they are trying to do just becuse they are so ridiculously blinkered about their views. If they had their way there would be no racing, no shows, no animals kept as pets and as for things like your favourite coursing - that will be gone before you can say "steroid joint injection"

And I do agree with that, too !
I detest PETA
But repeating myself, it's not about PETA. The story is about what the video exposes in the Asmussen operation. Condemning PETA for the video is kinda shooting-the-messenger stuff.