Speechless…
Eight Belles’ trainer defends jockey
Obviously I am not, as the title says, speechless or else there would not be any words here. What I am is perplexed by the events as a whole that have occurred here in central Kentucky over the last week or so.
First, last week during the Rolex Three Day event, 2 horses were put down due to injury and their respective riders suffered severe injuries also. Then came the injury to Eight Belles during the Kentucky Derby. It’s been said that things sometimes come in three’s. As for these three occurrence’s, we all could have done without them. Ironically, before reading this article, I had mentioned to Becky at how spindly the legs were on the Derby horses compared to the size of their bodies. And it seemed to this untrained eye that the breeding had left something out.
I am not nor have I ever been an animal activist but neither do I condone any mistreatment of animals. In the past Becky and I have rescued dogs that had been left abandoned. And it was a pitiful sight to see these dogs in the state they were in. Half to three fourths starved and with a thank you thank you look in their eyes.
To end this depressing post I don’t know if there is an answer or even if there is a question as to what happened to Eight Belles. Life sometimes is inherently painful and unfair and bad things happen to good people everyday. If on the other hand it comes to light that something the owner or trainer did led to Eight Belles breaking down. They should be prosecuted to the full measure and never allowed around animals again.
As always…I must be off.
The URI to TrackBack this entry is: http://kentuckycurmudgeon.wordpress.com/2008/05/05/speechless/trackback/
That was terrible what happened. Always hate to see such beautiful animals put down. I do however disagree how everyone is scrutinizing the horse racing industry. When a basketball player falls dead on the court do they question the sport? I just think they need to stop running Fillies in the Derby. Their bones are not as strong and are run hard against a field of formidable opponents.
Like you said, if there was foul play that lead to this then full prosecution should be taken but the sport shouldn’t be driven into the ground. People just take the worst when something like this happens then the media gets into it.
I tell you what pissed me off, all local news stations except LEX18 showed the horses breakdown. Why the hell did they need to show that? We all know what happened! It just feeds fuel to the fire and is totally unprofessional.