A Suffolk Downs ‘gem’ brings hope, a spark
Hillary Lak glanced indifferently at the mare. “She was cute, but she was too small,” Lak says, dismissively. With that quick summation and a shrug, Lak continued wending her way through the backside of Suffolk Downs last October, looking for a potential it horse to take her galloping across eventing fields yet to come. She looked and looked, but none caught her eye. And eventually, she felt like giving up. Her sister, however, along for the search, prodded her back toward the direction she’d come. “Just look at the mare again,” Lak was urged. Figuring that nobody else was jumping […]
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From New Mexico track with Love, Red is home
Some might say Redabyebye was once a horse with a pile of cards stacked against him. As racehorses go, he wasn’t all that good. And, he ran in low claimers at Ruidoso Downs in New Mexico, a racetrack recently investigated by the New York Times for its high rate of death and injury to jockeys and horses. In seven starts, Redabyebye hit the board only once, winning a mere $1,800 for a second-place finish. With such a poor showing at a track so near to Mexican slaughterhouses, his fate could have been in question. Yet, the stars aligned for this […]
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Veterinary Answers: Dr. Raul Bras on laminitis
Dr. Raul Bras, DVM, CJF at world-renowned Rood & Riddle Equine Hospital is on the front lines of the daily battle to keep horses sound. In another installment of a special Horse-Health Q&A series with OffTrackThoroughbreds, the podiatry expert answers questions about the dreaded disease, laminitis. Bras points out that the affliction, which led to the demise of racing greats Secretariat and Barbaro, stubbornly remains the second leading cause of death of horses. Here, the respected Rood &Riddle veterinarian, a 2005 graduate of Ross University School of Veterinary Medicine, answers questions about advances in treatment, and also offers a cautionary […]
