The funny thing about a Melbourne Cup and horse racing in general is that tragedy is often not too far away. Horses are mighty, but delicate beasts. A broken leg won’t kill a person, because we can get about on crutches and just lie about for awhile.
The biggest race in Australia was run yesterday, and just like last year when French mare Verema was euthanised after the race, it’s brought the issue squarely into focus again.
Two horses died, and it’s not good for anyone. The industry is mourning. Racing people love horses. It’s not a good look, and no one would argue otherwise.
But a broken leg is such an awful thing for a horse that they’re almost always euthanised by vets.
> Admire Rakti dies in post-Melbourne Cup tragedy
> Araldo euthanised after breaking leg after the running of the Cup
Why? Well, horses have a body the size of a ute but a brain the size of the badge on the grill. That’s not a knock on them, but they’re animals that can be frightened easily, and that won’t just do as commanded.
They can’t just take it easy for awhile. They don’t know when or how to just relax, rest up and have us humans run about trying to find the oats they like while putting on movies of grassy open fields.
In truth – horses need to stand. Lying down for too long just leads to other complications. To use the ute analogy again, horse legs are like bicycle tyres on a one-tonne pickup. Horses are 500 kilograms plus, but have unusually fine, brittle legs. Composed of no muscle, the extremities are only skin, tendons and bone. They’re designed to stand and gallop, but any injury will leave them badly damaged.
So a horse might survive surgery to fix up their leg, but they might survive to only hurt their leg again post-surgery as they move around, sometimes violently as they awake from surgery.
Or they might survive the post-operation complications, but then favour the other legs, leading to more problems. Horses can’t really be stopped from moving about, and the terrible pain and distress that puts them in means that they’re better off being humanely euthanised. Amputation is not an option either.
There are certain, rare cases where horses can be saved. It usually involves a lot of money and carefully suspending horses in swimming pools for weeks on end to avoid further injury, and it’s all for saving horses that have a special sentimental value, or perhaps are worth millions of dollars to the owners.
The Melbourne Cup is Australia’s biggest sporting event, and as we have seen in modern times, outcries are louder than ever after incidents like the two that happened yesterday occur. There’s plenty of people extremely upset about poor Admire Rakti, and poor Araldo, both suffering seemingly freak incidents.
But here’s what’s unusual. Two jockeys died in the past weeks.
South Australian jockey Caitlin Forrest died in hospital from injuries suffered in a terrible fall at Murray Bridge.
Queensland-based jockey Carly-Mae Pye lost her life in a barrier trial at Callaghan Park after another tragic fall.
Two young women doing their jobs. No #hashtagged fury.
Racing is dangerous. And it leads to tragedy far more than what anyone could reasonably argue is fair game.
But why does Australia only take to social media and comment forums with outrage turned up to truly when horses suffer tragedy?
It comes down to agendas, and what’s front of mind, in plain sight. People don’t want horse racing at all not because of the risks to humans, but to the animals themselves.
Albo
Guest
That's your choice June ! But your choice of religion is not of great interest to most people. Many more people still prefer to put humanity well before animals. Many more humans believe that nature provides dumb animals to assist the higher beings with their work, as their food source , for their clothing, for medical testing, or for entertainment. Whilst most humans do not deliberately seek to be cruel or cause harm to other animals, at the end of the day, they are but animals & well down the nature chain, and animals remain a natural resource for use by humans, to better the lot of humanity, whether as a pet, as a steak, as working dog, as a woolly jumper, or as a race horse ! Like all resources we should protect them & keep procreating them for human consumption whether as a zoo exhibit, a platter arrangement or for a potential Cox Plate cheque !
peeeko
Roar Guru
why doesnt anyone care about the greyhounds? they are animals too!
peeeko
Roar Guru
its not 0.8% its a lot lower, and horses are not human
rock
Roar Rookie
June, I really don't want to get into a full on slanging match and things will get very heated, however you are simply trying to push vegan lifestyle on everyone, if activists actually cared about animals they would put money into welfare but you don't, thank god you are only a minority and people are finally waking up to these groups.
june
Guest
Well, I am not a hypocrite because I am vegan. I do not use any animal products including honey. There are plenty of people like me and they are animal rights activists. We live what we preach as far as possible.
june
Guest
Exactly, that is why animal l activists are against any form of animal "owning" or eating, not just horse racing.
The Barry
Roar Guru
The choice that we're supposed to be giving horses isn't race or don't race. It's race or don't exist.
The Barry
Roar Guru
And admire rakti wasn't 'raced to death' as some people are suggesting. As soon as Zac Purton realised there was a problem with the horse he pulled up safely and stopped riding. The horse was taken immediately for a vets examination. He died of an undiagnosed heart condition. I went to school with a guy who's dad died doing the city to surf because he had an undiagnosed heart condition.
rock
Roar Rookie
Hi TB, I am also quite dubious on those figures, but I have seen them now sprouted a few times, I don't know if they have been verified or a number they are just going with. From reading though, these figures are to do with the number of horses that have raced which can include a number of starts for the same horse; the number is not quoted against the total runners per year. If you look at it from the total runners, the mortality rate is very similar to deaths in marathons.
The Barry
Roar Guru
Rock - thanks for the numbers. Do you know where they're from. I still query how those numbers are presented. If we accept that there have been 129 deaths out of 30,000 horses the mortality rate is 0.4% if the horses have one race start each. Put another way 0.4% = 1 out of every 250 race horses dies as a result of a race accident. (I'd dispute that figure anyway.) However there are race meetings in the five capitals and say 5 provincial meetings every day. With 8 races on every card and say 7 horses in every race that's 560 horses racing every day at a conservative estimate. A mortality rate of 0.4% would suggest that at least 2 horses would die in a race accident every day which clearly doesn't happen. If racing was only on 300 days a year that would give you 168,000 race starts which is still a very conservative figure at every step of the calculation. That puts the mortality rate at less than 0.1% of race starts.
rock
Roar Rookie
But the most are. The majority are go to family farms, equestrian etc. where they continue to be treated very well. Also, our pets never chose to be cooped up in our yards or house, yet they are there because there are countless breeders making money from it. Then thousands are euthenised when no longer wanted, not much gets said about this though.
Tenko
Roar Rookie
Tom, I'm going to sidetrack you again - I'm honestly not sure if athletes are looked after at the end of their careers. That's why we see 40+ year old boxers fight. That's why we see, according to Sports Illustrated, 78 percent of NFL players going bankrupt or facing serious financial stress within two years of retiring. In racing, trainers that stop that stop horses racing must fill in the details as to why and where they're going next. Plenty have post-racing careers in polo or equestrian. My family had an old race horse that we fed and tried to hop on when he wasn't cranky! :)
rock
Roar Rookie
Hi Tom, Actually reading an article today that was very objective on the whole situation and posted facts for both sides of the argument, the figure is actually 129 from 30,000, closer to 0.4% From another article the rate of cardiac arrest of marathon participants is close to 0.15% yet marathons continue to be run. I'm not saying this is ideal and can definitely be improved upon, however it is nowhere near as bad as people try to make out.
Tenko
Roar Rookie
Most people have been pretty fair. There's always a fringe, Michael. Thanks though. I'm diversifying to basketball with my next post! ;)
rock
Roar Rookie
'Entertainment - the action of providing or being provided with amusement or enjoyment.' I don't know about you CS however I quite enjoy playing around like throwing ball with my two dogs, it definitely entertains me and I quite like their companionship, if you think pets do not provide a form of entertainment you are kidding yourself. And your comment saying one of the main reason is 'to provide the with shelter, food and water opposed to letting them go stray to be diseased, starving and die' is very misleading and no where near tells the whole story. What is the reason for this? Well it is very similar to the thoroughbred industry. The reason pets generally need to be sheltered is due to the countless breeders raking in massive amounts of money, then when the animal is not wanted it is taken to a shelter and usually euthanized. Sounds very similar to an industry you want to shut down doesn't it.
Tom
Guest
Thanks tenko. The key difference between these 'sports' being that horses don't choose to compete and are not afforded the same care after their career. -- Comment from The Roar's iPhone app.
michael steel
Guest
Tenko, you've written a very good article and in many cases been shown no respect.
Bondy
Guest
Tenko Just putting it out there mate for discussion ...
Tenko
Roar Rookie
Hard to blame the VRC for someone waving a flag, but the VRC have made temporary changes already.
Tenko
Roar Rookie
Hi Tom - the sport most like horse racing that involves humans and casualties is anything where head trauma occurs regularly. Boxing and NFL (see: concussions, rather than 'on field'). Those sports are considered acceptable, with an acknowledged backlash as well. Wrestling has an alarmingly high number of deaths as well.