Departures 2009

I tto think crazyhorse and you others have hit the nail on the head. Flat bred horses are not just going hurdling now either, they go chasing, and the percussion from firmish ground on more fragile legs is bound to be greater over fences than hurdles since the horse lands more steeply, putting more weight on the forelegs. This has a culmulative effect.

It's why old-school trainers like Henderson won't do summer jumping - I've heard him personally say what it does to horses legs and knees, and he trains mostly NH bred horses. In the old days horses were given time to mature too, before going jumping, and had a regime which built up bone and muscle in the legs with plenty of road-work etc. It's hard to know how this process can be reversed - like the push to breed ever more precocious 2yr olds, it's commercially driven.

And maybe fewer owners now have the knowledge of horses, their breeding confirmation etc than in the past, esp where NH is concerned

Nh trainers are using flat bred horses simply because it takes a lot more speed to win these days than it used to. If the emphasis was to breed a sounder horse in general rather than breeding a slow maturing 'NH type' or an overly precocious 'flat type' than fatalities would obviously decrease. Only the authorities can make this happen. I would suggest some kind of meaningful 4yr old and older only championship for flat horses. It would take the pressure off trainers having to push their charges too hard before time allowing time to mature and give breeders a chance to see colts close to their prime. 2yr old Sales races should be banned.

There should be some kind of guidelines on the ratio of bone density in the leg to what they are carrying on top for both stallions and mares. Sometimes you wonder how these horses with spindle legs manage to stand up at all.

As far as Henderson and his old school attitudes, his Vet wasn't very old school was he......meow ;)
 
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the three-time winner of the Ladbrokes World Hurdle, was put down on Friday morning after being struck down by a serious bout of colic.
The former champion, who retired in January this year, underwent surgery on Thursday after being found lying in a field at owner Graham Wylie's stud at Humshaugh in Northumberland but his condition worsened on Friday morning.
Trainer Howard Johnson said: "Yesterday morning he was laid down in the field up at Chesters, Graham Wylie's stud. They got the vet in and he went to Bearl Equine Clinic in Stocksfield. He hadsurgery and was stable last night but this morning he couldn't get up at all so after talking to Graham and myself they put him down humanely this morning."
Inglis Drever, who was ten, won 17 races from 35 starts and nearly £800,000 in prize-money. Thirteen of his victories came over hurdles after he was recruited by Johnson from Sir Mark Prescott's Flat stable for 110,000gns.
He won his first three starts over jumps and was beaten just half a lengthby Fundamentalist in the Royal & Sun Alliance Novices' Hurdle in 2004. The following season, having won the Haydock Champion Hurdle Trial and Kingwell Hurdle, he returned to Cheltenham to bag his first World Hurdle from former champion Baracouda.
He was denied the opportunity to defend his title the following season after suffering a tendon injury in a fall at Chepstow in December 2005, but returned better than ever to recapture the crown with victory over Mighty Man in 2007.
He became the first three-time winner of the race in March last year when he defeated Kasbah Bliss.
Last season Inglis Drever was set to mount a challenge for a fourth Cheltenham title but injured a hock at Newbury in November and was eventually retired in the new year after efforts to get him fit again were abandoned.
Johnson added: "He never got a retirement or nowt. I've not seen the lovely horse since he left here for his retirement.
"He's been my pride and joy since I bought him five years ago off Sir Mark Prescott. I will never get another horse to replace him. He's been very good to me. It's very sad. He was the flag-bearer."
 
Sheikh, as I've said elsewhere and in the past too many times to count, the French don't have these problems or require further rules, regulations, and nannying. Their jumps horses are schooled specifically for the job. They don't spend years on the Flat and then use the hurdling route as a dustbin. I used the term 'dustbin of the Flat' a few years ago and was taken to task by, if I recall, Shadow Leader. However, it seems that perhaps rather more people agree with me - one has only to witness the extremely unruly, over-heated, hard-pulling horses who've only spent a couple of months off Flat duty tanking towards hurdles they balloon, bunny-hop, crash through, etc., to know that all is far from well with that scene in the UK. Attend any Flat Seller after the race, and note how many times the auctioneer will tell the audience "sure to make a nice hurdler - plenty of size", as if that were the main criterion for a change of career.

Contrast and compare with the Irish, where, although their fields are overstuffed with no-hopers (thanks to far too much production, subsidised by their govt.), the competitors are generally better behaved. Contrast again with the French, schooled over small obstacles from soon after they're first ridden, and hurdling competently and confidently at three, and you'll be horrified by the comparison. Yes, the French don't anticipate seeing their horses still gasping round a three-miler at Fontwell when they're 12 or 13, because by then they reckon they'll have proved themselves good enough to not need to do so. They see no extra kudos on running a horse until it's teen-aged. To them, it has a specific job to do, and it's therefore trained to do it from the get-go, rack up a satisfying number of wins and places, and then retire. They also don't decide to throw their animals into chasing because they're a dud at hurdles - something the UK is also increasingly prone to think is all right.

When you see how well-behaved, focussed on the job, and rideable the French (and, in all fairness, many of the Irish) hurdlers are, you realise why so many of our top trainers have imported dozens of French and Irish specific-bred animals. They present a much more reliable betting medium, if that's what you want, since they're immediately at work, not requiring several attempts to understand what's wanted and rarely tipping up in their early races, with the fatal results we see from the under-schooled, still Flat-psyched, animals we are too prone to use here.
 
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Yes, I think it probably was me and I'd disagree with you on this subject again and again and again. Both your theories that hurdling is the 'dustbin of the flat' and your theories that French horses are all that is wonderful, jump perfectly, and the French have it all sewn up. They aren't and they don't.

However, I'm not about to bore myself or anyone else in going over old ground again, not least since it won't make an iota of difference to your theories!!
 
Well, if the French horses aren't that wonderful, explain why our best trainers continue to harvest them from France, Shadz?

I don't have the inclination (shorthand for "I'm too lazy") to bother trying to find out how many poor Flat horses enter hurdling in the UK, but we don't breed for it, and we don't school for it specifically in the way that the French do, and it shows. But, I'm quite happy to keep an open mind on the subject - when you can point out fields made up of hurdling-specific British-made nags to me, I'll be happy to stop carping about their generally poor behaviour.

You're taking things too far with the remarks about the French, though - I haven't said anything nearly as dramatic as that. I've just recommended Sheikh to take a look at how much better the French school their animals specifically for the task they're intended for. The topic is, after all, revolving around the deaths at Wetherby where the two hurdling deaths are related to 3 y.o. ex-Flat horses having their second hurdles outings after a far from glorious career prior to then.

Tell you what I will do, though: I'll make a note of all the dead hurdlers' provenance. We might then see which have been schooled from the outset, what caused their death (we ought to discount heart attacks as a result of schooling, good, bad, or indifferent, for example), and which have been chucked into hurdling after a few unsuccessful twirls round Southwell. If I could be bothered, I'd trawl back over the past few years' stats to shore up my own argument with some figures, but I might just restrict that exercise to 2009, taking it into 2010.

You say I'm wrong, Shadz, but you don't offer a contradiction of your own on either count to say why. Okay... why?
 
Because we've been over it before, x amount of times, Kri, and I'm bored to death of it!

I'm not saying the French horses are no good - far from it - but you do have bit of a habit of banging on about them like they are the solution to everything especially when offered as a wonderful alternative to the badly behaved, badly schooled Irish and British horses who can't jump! The Irish and British bred horses aren't the horrendous beasts compared to the wonderful French animals that you seem to infer they are, honest!
 
The problem with the 3yo hurdlers isn't racing them aged three (top French 3yo hurdler Temple Lord contested group races at 2 on the flat) or not being bred for the job they're asked to do more a case of not being trained properly. Take for instance the carnage that resulted in Lucy Horner's injuries at Hexham or the various instances we see during the summer, or as has been mentioned over on TRF one particular trainer buying 4 or 5 3yos off the flat and having them entered up in selling hurdles 7 days later.

That said certain flat-bred horses will be better suited to the French style of racing than the UK style.
 
According to Kim Baileys Blog one of Nigel Twiston Davies horses broke a leg on the gallops yesterday but does not mention a name
 
Shadz, we've been 'over it' only once before. I'm disappointed in your lack of stamina, girl! I'd hoped for at least 25 more posts as we mud-wrestled ourselves to mutual exhaustion!

No, I haven't said that the Irish are badly-behaved - just that there are too many no-hopers in their fields, which is self-evident to anyone who watches their racing. I wouldn't say that the French are all perfect or the British all horrendous, either. Just that the majority of hurdling in the UK is comprised now of badly-behaved, under-schooled ex-Flatties. That's not the horses' fault, of course. They haven't had time to adjust to the difference between how they race on the Flat and how they should race when obstacles are in their way. You know better than most how you don't want something tanking off, pulling, resenting being restrained - and not understanding why it's being pulled and yanked to three-quarter pace - when it figures it should be going much faster.

Okay, we'll agree to disagree, as neither of us will move on certain points of view. :surrender:





But I'm right, of course! :lol::lol:
 
I think it went on for a while, though, Shadz... probably spread it over a few weeks! You know what it's like with us wimminfolk - probably discussed our latest shoes and handbags in amongst the virtues of stuffed hurdles vs the old ones, French double banks and the merits of removing British water jumps... ;)
 
Think we just lost one of my favourite horses Rendons Grace in a G3 Hurdle race at Auteuil. The horse had a real future ahead of him after beating Jumbo Rio twice in the spring :(
 
According to Kim Baileys Blog one of Nigel Twiston Davies horses broke a leg on the gallops yesterday but does not mention a name

He was referring to Weather Front in the first race at Cheltenham who accidently interfered with his own (KB's) horse during the incident in which it sustained a broken leg.
 
Definitely CL - gutted that he's gone, was excited to see him go over fences in the near future :(

Rock Noir won the race well as you'd expect from an odds-on favourite - I hope JP doesn't send him to O'Neill :(
 
RP's unreliable 'comments in running' say WELSH EMPEROR broke down, while Simon Mapletoft's wrap on ATR said 'good news' - it looked like he'd be all right. When he was being held in the background by his jockey, he seemed to look okay, quite sound, and as if all that had happened was a very bad stumble. What happened, then, if he's been pts?
 
Gutted about Welsh Emperor but makes you wouldn't what else he had to prove as a 10yo. I know some will counter that the horse couldn't have done without his racing but doesn't really wash with me.

Also,The Staffy of Tom Dascombe's didn't make it the other night:(
 
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