Departures 2010
- Thread starter Aldaniti
- Start date
Shadow Leader
At the Start
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- Nov 9, 2003
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- 9,884
Dalradian was put down earlier this week.
Oh, *%$£!! I liked that horse a helluva lot. Ferk, feck, bugger. Do you know the reason, Shadz? He did well at Lingfield and his owner, Roger Kilby of Canisbay Bloodstock, is a good egg. I'll ask him what happened if he's in this week.
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Hope so, thanks.
Irish Stamp
Forum Moderator
Declared to run in a Handicap Hurdle at Hexham tomorrow Bloodnok.
davidjohnson
At the Start
- Joined
- Jun 29, 2007
- Messages
- 3,434
Yes it careered through two sets of railings. The treatment of the horse meant there was a delay to the rest of the card.
And talking of brains, here's the follow-up to DALRADIAN's unfortunate demise, via the owner, Roger Kilby, today. The horse had finished a piece of work and was heading for the stables when he stumbled and pitched forward, spooking the horse in front of him. This horse, frightened by the kerfuffle behind him, lashed out and caught poor DALRADIAN square in the forehead, whereupon he collapsed, unconscious. He was down for a long time, then got up, a bit woozy, and William Knight's team trailered him back to the stables, where he rested. Later on, he was taken outside to see how he was, where he had a fit. The vet decided he'd received brain damage, and the poor animal was put to sleep. Very unluckily for Roger, a short time later a new, unraced 3 y.o. of his broke a leg on the gallops and was also destroyed. I suggested he watch where he was walking today!
Isinglass
At the Start
Some things that happen in life make you wonder how unlucky an animal or a person can be. Timing is everything, things could have been so different. Poor horse.
Roger is a nice guy, I met him a few times when we had club horses with John Akehurst. He used to have loads there.
Roger is a nice guy, I met him a few times when we had club horses with John Akehurst. He used to have loads there.
Last year, his horses were zooming in left, right and centre at Lingfield, with Roger regularly picking up prizes in the winner's enclosure. It's been quieter this year, although as he said, DALRADIAN was one of the better ones and likely to have continued to do well for him. You're right, Isi, he's a lovely person - unfailingly pleasant, as are his friends who accompany him from time to time.
chroniclandlord
Senior Jockey
The Ballydoyle 3yo His Way was PTS after braking a leg at Clonmel yesterday evening.
BlazingWalker
At the Start
Looked like Sidney Sling broke a hind leg there at Ffos Las.
Irish Stamp
Forum Moderator
Master Charm found dead in his stable - was due to run at Ffos Las last night.
Narcotic Nora
Apprentice
The Oxx horse Haralan, who was pulled up injured in the Saval Beg.
Recent winner Catskill, who was right there with a chance when falling two out at Kilbeggan.
There is absolute carnage at the moment in Ireland and while I appreciate these are the dangers with Summer jumps racing, is it really acceptable to produce firm ground for jumpers? Every jumps meeting over the last three to four weeks has resulted in four or five injured jocks, and one still in a serious condition in hospital. The Irish tracks are only watering three/fur days before a meeting when they should be doing it a week before. No jumps horse needs it firm, good to firm is as fast as it should be and even then, moregood than firm.
There is absolute carnage at the moment in Ireland and while I appreciate these are the dangers with Summer jumps racing, is it really acceptable to produce firm ground for jumpers? Every jumps meeting over the last three to four weeks has resulted in four or five injured jocks, and one still in a serious condition in hospital. The Irish tracks are only watering three/fur days before a meeting when they should be doing it a week before. No jumps horse needs it firm, good to firm is as fast as it should be and even then, moregood than firm.
You'll get the old argument trotted out by some that their horses 'love to hear their feet rattle', Cantoris, against other than Good to Firm, or Firm. Fine, maybe they do, but they'll also hear their bones snap, crackle and pop when they fall or are BD. There is no such thing as safe jumping ground - IMO - when it's firmer than GS.
By all means gallop on the G/GF if you must, but the impact on landing must be at least twice as hard on bones as just running over it. I've wondered if courses shouldn't lay out several feet of tan (finely-ground wood bark) or even Polytrack, a good foot deep, to help soften the concussion on landing. If there was a fall, at least it would be on a more giving surface.
When I lived in Africa, where the ground came up hard as nails for months on end, we used to lay a thick carpeting of wood shavings on the landing sides of show jumps, and never lost a horse to broken bones, in spite of the ground being virtually grassless between April to November.
Summer jumps racing is hateful stuff for many reasons - when it's really hot, where is the sense in a 3m race, heat-stressing animals, and forcing them to risk severe injury or death on hard ground?
I know I've gone on enough to bore myself to death on the subject, but this is where 'jumps racing' has entirely divorced itself from the seasonally-related 'National Hunt' racing. Hunting didn't go on all year, for good reason, not just because the hunts would've not given fox populations enough time to cub and recover from winter kills, but because they'd be shooting their own hunters and breaking their own bones more than they did in the season.
I've lost all interest in watching horses dying every day for this nonsense, especially because I find the spectacle unethical and unedifying. If we are trying to attract a wider audience to racing, watching beautiful animals being deliberately faced with the possibility of breaking their bones doesn't seem to be one of the best PR moves. Jockeys have a choice as to whether to ride or not, their horses don't. We should be proving our superior intellectual status by not shoving them onto surfaces which are not naturally suited to the event.
By all means gallop on the G/GF if you must, but the impact on landing must be at least twice as hard on bones as just running over it. I've wondered if courses shouldn't lay out several feet of tan (finely-ground wood bark) or even Polytrack, a good foot deep, to help soften the concussion on landing. If there was a fall, at least it would be on a more giving surface.
When I lived in Africa, where the ground came up hard as nails for months on end, we used to lay a thick carpeting of wood shavings on the landing sides of show jumps, and never lost a horse to broken bones, in spite of the ground being virtually grassless between April to November.
Summer jumps racing is hateful stuff for many reasons - when it's really hot, where is the sense in a 3m race, heat-stressing animals, and forcing them to risk severe injury or death on hard ground?
I know I've gone on enough to bore myself to death on the subject, but this is where 'jumps racing' has entirely divorced itself from the seasonally-related 'National Hunt' racing. Hunting didn't go on all year, for good reason, not just because the hunts would've not given fox populations enough time to cub and recover from winter kills, but because they'd be shooting their own hunters and breaking their own bones more than they did in the season.
I've lost all interest in watching horses dying every day for this nonsense, especially because I find the spectacle unethical and unedifying. If we are trying to attract a wider audience to racing, watching beautiful animals being deliberately faced with the possibility of breaking their bones doesn't seem to be one of the best PR moves. Jockeys have a choice as to whether to ride or not, their horses don't. We should be proving our superior intellectual status by not shoving them onto surfaces which are not naturally suited to the event.
Kri, you make many good points there but I do think there is a place for jumps racing during the Summer. As you say, there are plenty of horses out there that want to hear their hooves rattle. I think good edging to good to firm is as fast as it should be. The real issue is that Irish tracks are getting lazy and cost conscious in only watering a few days before. Wexford and Punchestown recently were an absolute disgrace. And not just for the horses.
Well, thanks for that, Cantoris - I'm usually shot down in flames over this subject, but it's not the galloping that generally kills them - although fractures may well start on the flat and end up snapping on landing concussion. I would not want to see any jumping at any time of the year on Firm, full stop. I don't think it's a fair ask when we know that chasing (and to a somewhat lesser degree hurdling) can result in many horses being BD, sometimes multiply, and can hit the deck in a shoulder-shattering crunch, when they have been enjoying the race otherwise. With Soft, there are still cracks and crunches - really, only Soft to Heavy or even Heavy - which we saw a lot of this last winter - tends to ensure that more get round without bone-snapping, since speed is not a factor.
The firmer it is, the faster they go. That means that instead of lumbering up to the open ditch out of soggy ground, they're zinging it, with not just a much faster smash into the ground, but no chance for the ground to absorb some of the impact and to allow the horse to slide. It's a dumb joke that there is much pontificating about the unsafeness of Polytrack (or the perception of it being so, since no-one's yet hurdled on it) as it doesn't permit horses to slide once they hit the ground. Good is pretty much the equivalent surface, while GF and certainly F is just dead, like a lot of the animals which have the unfortunate happen to them. You might as well put jumps racing over Polytrack and see whether it results in the same amount of casualites or not.
GF/F - no absorption of impact, no chance to slither or slide, much more speed to the races. As far as setting up the chance of your horse not surviving a fall, it's brilliant.
As for the watering business, I'm sure that they could conserve their Euros if they didn't water all the track, but concentrated on the areas up to 70 feet from the landing side of the jumps, making them softer to land in. Yes, it would be an experiment of sorts, but it would provide for a more shock-absorbent landing, a couple of strides, and away. If the horse fell, it would provide enough area for a potential slide, rather than just a heavy dead smack into the ground.
However, that quite possibly contravenes some sort of watering policy laid down in IBHA rules, as far as I know!
Tracks can be very water-intensive and in these days of supposedly conserving resources, this would be one possible solution to those intent on running their heavier jumping horses on harder ground. It's rarely the bits between the jumps that does them in, so Clerks should perhaps reflect their cost concerns and say that there are one or two cheaper solutions. Their problem is that they have to start declaring the state of the ground so early and, given the vagaries of our weather, probably assume that as soon as they water, rain will come in drenching bucketloads, so don't want to start calling 'Good', only to find 'Soft, Heavy in Places' five days later.
Have you e-mailed the Clerks at Wexford and Punchestown to find out why they didn't continue their watering programme right up to racing? It'd be interesting to find out why they called things off and let the ground dry out so. As a well-respected connection in racing, they should have the courtesy to reply to you with a decent explanation.
The firmer it is, the faster they go. That means that instead of lumbering up to the open ditch out of soggy ground, they're zinging it, with not just a much faster smash into the ground, but no chance for the ground to absorb some of the impact and to allow the horse to slide. It's a dumb joke that there is much pontificating about the unsafeness of Polytrack (or the perception of it being so, since no-one's yet hurdled on it) as it doesn't permit horses to slide once they hit the ground. Good is pretty much the equivalent surface, while GF and certainly F is just dead, like a lot of the animals which have the unfortunate happen to them. You might as well put jumps racing over Polytrack and see whether it results in the same amount of casualites or not.
GF/F - no absorption of impact, no chance to slither or slide, much more speed to the races. As far as setting up the chance of your horse not surviving a fall, it's brilliant.
As for the watering business, I'm sure that they could conserve their Euros if they didn't water all the track, but concentrated on the areas up to 70 feet from the landing side of the jumps, making them softer to land in. Yes, it would be an experiment of sorts, but it would provide for a more shock-absorbent landing, a couple of strides, and away. If the horse fell, it would provide enough area for a potential slide, rather than just a heavy dead smack into the ground.
However, that quite possibly contravenes some sort of watering policy laid down in IBHA rules, as far as I know!
Tracks can be very water-intensive and in these days of supposedly conserving resources, this would be one possible solution to those intent on running their heavier jumping horses on harder ground. It's rarely the bits between the jumps that does them in, so Clerks should perhaps reflect their cost concerns and say that there are one or two cheaper solutions. Their problem is that they have to start declaring the state of the ground so early and, given the vagaries of our weather, probably assume that as soon as they water, rain will come in drenching bucketloads, so don't want to start calling 'Good', only to find 'Soft, Heavy in Places' five days later.
Have you e-mailed the Clerks at Wexford and Punchestown to find out why they didn't continue their watering programme right up to racing? It'd be interesting to find out why they called things off and let the ground dry out so. As a well-respected connection in racing, they should have the courtesy to reply to you with a decent explanation.
