The Thoroughbred Stimulus Program
I meant to say that with regard to Casey’s Girl, the filly that won last week, was bred by one of my Facebook (and originally a Mountaineer person), Jennifer Brooks. This means that all the money Casey has earned so far this year (about 12,000) PLUS any other dough she racks up will be awarded to Jen next February.
Due to the tireless efforts of the West Virginia Breeders Association to fatten the wallet of the WV Thoroughbred Development Fund, we now have lotsa Government $$ to compete for.
And not only that, but Lori also gets money in February just for being the current owner. This is not the actual money she earned, the purse money has been paid out already. This is the equivalent of a matching fund! There’s nothing better then knowing that if you can just make it to the second month of the year, you’ll be able to buy oats for your horses and shoes for your kids.
Last spring, Lori had surgery done on both of her home-breds. One had a slab fracture of the knee and one had a fractured cannon bone. Believe it or not, they both apparently won their respective races with these injuries; a testament especially to Mercy, the little chestnut and older sister.
She would go out to train twice a week, and although she would be falling down sore, the vet couldn’t see anything on his x-rays, so she had to keep going. This is a true dilemma for a horseman (woman). You have spent four months getting your young horse fit enough to run, you’ve run it several times and now it’s fit enough to win. It also has clearly understood the nature of the game and what’s at stake.
Everything’s ready; you’re on “go”, and suddenly the horse is limping.
You’ve spent a thousand dollars just on exercise bills (just on me – that’s my job; Exercise). 14 weeks of feed – about 14 bags at 15 bucks a pop, so that’s $210, plus at least 4 bales of straw for bedding a week at 3 bucks, $170, hay 2 bales a week at 5.00, $140, and of course there are the supplements; You’ve got your 30 days of vitamins; roughly $50 so that’s bit over $150, plus you hafta have an iron supplement ($16 x 3), a glucosamine / msm source ($12.95 x 3), and some B1 if he or she is nervous, or some other supplement the vet says your trainee could be lacking.
Then, you have 3 visits from the farrier, $300, one visit from the tooth fairy (dentist) $50, and visits from (or to) the horsie doc for snotty nose, cough, a touch of colic or bouts of tying up syndrome (sever muscle cramps that can nearly immobilize a horse and cause it to drop to the ground if not kept moving or given pain relief). And don’t forget to add the cost of prescriptions: Sulfa, Penicillin, Bute, Banamine, Electrolytes, DMSO, Tagamet, Clenbuterol, Lasix (I’m surprised the French haven’t accused Uncle Sam of biological warfare).
Cha-ching! Total: about $2500. In the meantime, you have nothing coming in, because your job is training the horse, so you hafta pay all your other bills, too. Plus the horse doesn’t win right away; it’s still learning and by the time it’s ready to win it may have raced several times, adding two more months of expenses PLUS the costs of race day medication, and someone to assist you for the event (that’s if it can win because maybe it can’t but you don’t know ‘til you’ve tested it).
You’ve emptied your checking account and maxed-out your credit, and your horse is ready to bail you out with a tremendous performance in which it must best nine others like itself backed by nine others like you, and now the horse is lame.
You have a choice: to scratch the horse and feed it for another two weeks and hope that’s all it will be laid up for, then work another week to get it back to where you want it before you can enter again (except you can’t afford to buy the straw, the hay and the shoes for another three weeks), or run the horse. So unless the vet can tell you not to, you run.
That’s a way of life for a lot of horseman, and especially true for horsemen here at Mountaineer Park; unless they have really strong backing from owners that have tons of dough and no place to spend it. In fact, a favorite saying of racehorse people is that you can build a small fortune in this business - provided you begin with a large one. There are very few people who can afford to do that.
Asking why we do what we do is like asking why anyone would be trying to climb the Corporate ladder…We like working with horses, dressing casual every day, telling dirty jokes at the top of our lungs and harassing each other needlessly. And if you leave the track and go to the farms and keep going to all the places that have a few racehorses, you discover why this industry is so important. It employs a lot of people.
And I’m sure if you ask a horseman about their animals, their replies would demonstrate that most of them do love their horses, and love the seven days a week with no sick days or holidays. The reason I do it is that I have to have my work be my play, or else I’m just doing a job. And I had to cover my social life while working because when I’m done then I want to go home and be by myself, which I also love. And it saves money if you never have to go out at night ‘cuz out’s where you go when you leave the house every morning. So I have it all. All except money and power.
But I digress; while the whole point of the Thoroughbred Development fund is to improve the breed in the state of West Virginia, and whether it does actually do that remains to be seen, the one thing I can say with certainty is that February is Christmas for the horsemen of the Northern Panhandle. Without it I don't know what we'd do right now, as bad as the economy has been.
Due to the tireless efforts of the West Virginia Breeders Association to fatten the wallet of the WV Thoroughbred Development Fund, we now have lotsa Government $$ to compete for.
And not only that, but Lori also gets money in February just for being the current owner. This is not the actual money she earned, the purse money has been paid out already. This is the equivalent of a matching fund! There’s nothing better then knowing that if you can just make it to the second month of the year, you’ll be able to buy oats for your horses and shoes for your kids.
Last spring, Lori had surgery done on both of her home-breds. One had a slab fracture of the knee and one had a fractured cannon bone. Believe it or not, they both apparently won their respective races with these injuries; a testament especially to Mercy, the little chestnut and older sister.
She would go out to train twice a week, and although she would be falling down sore, the vet couldn’t see anything on his x-rays, so she had to keep going. This is a true dilemma for a horseman (woman). You have spent four months getting your young horse fit enough to run, you’ve run it several times and now it’s fit enough to win. It also has clearly understood the nature of the game and what’s at stake.
Everything’s ready; you’re on “go”, and suddenly the horse is limping.
You’ve spent a thousand dollars just on exercise bills (just on me – that’s my job; Exercise). 14 weeks of feed – about 14 bags at 15 bucks a pop, so that’s $210, plus at least 4 bales of straw for bedding a week at 3 bucks, $170, hay 2 bales a week at 5.00, $140, and of course there are the supplements; You’ve got your 30 days of vitamins; roughly $50 so that’s bit over $150, plus you hafta have an iron supplement ($16 x 3), a glucosamine / msm source ($12.95 x 3), and some B1 if he or she is nervous, or some other supplement the vet says your trainee could be lacking.
Then, you have 3 visits from the farrier, $300, one visit from the tooth fairy (dentist) $50, and visits from (or to) the horsie doc for snotty nose, cough, a touch of colic or bouts of tying up syndrome (sever muscle cramps that can nearly immobilize a horse and cause it to drop to the ground if not kept moving or given pain relief). And don’t forget to add the cost of prescriptions: Sulfa, Penicillin, Bute, Banamine, Electrolytes, DMSO, Tagamet, Clenbuterol, Lasix (I’m surprised the French haven’t accused Uncle Sam of biological warfare).
Cha-ching! Total: about $2500. In the meantime, you have nothing coming in, because your job is training the horse, so you hafta pay all your other bills, too. Plus the horse doesn’t win right away; it’s still learning and by the time it’s ready to win it may have raced several times, adding two more months of expenses PLUS the costs of race day medication, and someone to assist you for the event (that’s if it can win because maybe it can’t but you don’t know ‘til you’ve tested it).
You’ve emptied your checking account and maxed-out your credit, and your horse is ready to bail you out with a tremendous performance in which it must best nine others like itself backed by nine others like you, and now the horse is lame.
You have a choice: to scratch the horse and feed it for another two weeks and hope that’s all it will be laid up for, then work another week to get it back to where you want it before you can enter again (except you can’t afford to buy the straw, the hay and the shoes for another three weeks), or run the horse. So unless the vet can tell you not to, you run.
That’s a way of life for a lot of horseman, and especially true for horsemen here at Mountaineer Park; unless they have really strong backing from owners that have tons of dough and no place to spend it. In fact, a favorite saying of racehorse people is that you can build a small fortune in this business - provided you begin with a large one. There are very few people who can afford to do that.
Asking why we do what we do is like asking why anyone would be trying to climb the Corporate ladder…We like working with horses, dressing casual every day, telling dirty jokes at the top of our lungs and harassing each other needlessly. And if you leave the track and go to the farms and keep going to all the places that have a few racehorses, you discover why this industry is so important. It employs a lot of people.
And I’m sure if you ask a horseman about their animals, their replies would demonstrate that most of them do love their horses, and love the seven days a week with no sick days or holidays. The reason I do it is that I have to have my work be my play, or else I’m just doing a job. And I had to cover my social life while working because when I’m done then I want to go home and be by myself, which I also love. And it saves money if you never have to go out at night ‘cuz out’s where you go when you leave the house every morning. So I have it all. All except money and power.
But I digress; while the whole point of the Thoroughbred Development fund is to improve the breed in the state of West Virginia, and whether it does actually do that remains to be seen, the one thing I can say with certainty is that February is Christmas for the horsemen of the Northern Panhandle. Without it I don't know what we'd do right now, as bad as the economy has been.
posted by hoofstep at
7:49 PM
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