CHARLESTON, S.C. (Wednesday, April 19, 2017) — Increased
out-of-competition testing, investing in additional investigators and research
into emerging threats is the most effective way to catch — and, more
importantly, deter — cheating in horse racing.
That was the big take-away from the drug-testing forum on
opening day of the Association of Racing Commissioners International’s 83rd
annual conference on Equine Welfare and Racing Integrity at the Charleston
Marriott.
The panel featured Dr. Scott Stanley of the University of
California, Davis, which conducts that state’s horse-racing testing; Dr.
Anthony Fontana of Truesdail Laboratories; and, speaking via teleconferencing,
Dr. George Maylin, the longtime director of the New York Equine Drug Testing
and Research Laboratory. Also on the panel was Brice Cote, a former
standardbred driver and detective in New Jersey State Police’s racetrack unit
who heads the integrity efforts at The Meadowlands, Tioga and Vernon Downs
harness tracks.
Even if the panelists expressed varying beliefs on the
prevalence of rules-violators, they all emphasized the importance of
out-of-competition testing — taking samples from horses in between races — as a
way to detect substances that no longer show in traditional blood or urine
tests from samples taken immediately after a race but still could have an
impact on a horse’s performance.
"The only way we're going to stop this is by
intelligence-based policing and out-of-competition testing," Cote said.
“Most jurisdictions have very good drug testing,” Stanley said
afterward. “We do robust testing, and most of the labs are accredited as well.
Now we look at big challenges. And when you look at big challenges, you can
make those mountains into molehills, or you can take them off one at a time and
get them knocked down. We are doing both. We are taking the ones that have
legitimate concerns for the industry, like cobalt when that came up. We found
that, set a threshold, established rules and made that go away — quickly.
Steroids, anabolic and corticosteroids, those now are well-regulated. This are
big wins for the industry. They weren’t low-hanging fruit either. We still have
some challenges that have now climbed the tree, they’re higher up. And we need
to knock those off.”
Stanley discussed the potential of “biological passports” as a
tool, in its infancy of development for equines, that could be used in
out-of-competition testing. The testing would provide a baseline result to
which subsequent testing both pre-race and between races could be compared.
“If they change abruptly, if the bio-markers tell us this horse
was given an anabolic agent, we don’t have to detect it,” he said of the exact
substance. “We’d be able to say, ‘This horse cannot naturally produce this
profile. It has to be enhanced.’”
“Informed testing, focused testing and targeting testing is
something we need to put more emphasis on,” said ARCI president Ed Martin. “Out
of competition testing should be expanded, but it’s real value doesn’t come
until you’ve expended the research dollars to be able to detect the substances
not being detected in the existing out-of-competition testing.”
Also Tuesday:
A panel of administrative veterinarians discussed keeping
horses’ treatment records and the trust issues that arise among equine
practitioners, horsemen and regulators as to proper use.
Dr. Scott Palmer, New York’s equine medical director, said that
regulators getting horses’ treatment records can benefit horsemen and
veterinarians because of the research made possible. He noted that Depo-Medrol
was the most popular corticosteroid used in joint injections up until 2012.
Unknown at the time, the medication could pool in other tissue and stick around
longer when used in hocks and stifles, trickier joints than ankles, Palmer
said.
“We discovered that Depo-Medrol could be found in the joint in a
blood test of a horse as long as 100 days after the administration period,” he
said. “The idea that you go on the (Racing Medication & Testing Consortium)
guidelines and see 21 days for Depo-Medrol is a risky business. It wasn’t
accurate, because there was such a variation in the amount of time that the
Depo-Medrol would be discoverable in a post-race blood test.”
Palmer said that, with what was learned from knowing the
location of injections and the timing of administration, veterinarians were
cautioned about using Depo-Medrol in the first place. He said that today in New
York if a veterinarian uses Depo-Medrol, the horse must be tested for the
substance before running.
“That’s a good example how we can use the research findings from
the medical records, the treatment records to protect people and help create a
better regulatory policy,” Palmer said.
A morning panel brought various perspectives on how to promote
the good in horse racing while not ignoring issues facing the sport.
Wagner to players:
‘Regulators do strive to get it right’
Judy Wagner, outgoing ARCI chair and horse racing’s First Lady
of Handicapping, had a message for her fellow horseplayers.
Wagner is the 2001 National Horseplayers Championship winner,
the horseplayers’ representative on the board of the National Thoroughbred
Racing Association and the vice chair of the Louisiana Racing Commission. With
her one-year term as ARCI chair ending Thursday, she’ll hand the baton to
chair-elect Jeff Colliton of the Washington Horse Racing Commission.
“As a horseplayer — and this is a message that I want to get
across to horseplayers: Regulators do strive to get it right,” she told the
audience at the Charleston Marriott for the three-day conference. “We really
want to make the players, everybody in the industry, feel that we have an
industry of integrity.
“Let handicappers know that they have a product that they can
respect; they don’t have to handicap the rumors that this trainer is doping
horses or whatever. And saying that, I wish that we could educate the public
that there is a difference between d-o-p-e and legal medication to help the
horse. There is a place for therapeutic drugs.”
Committee recommends
banning Clenbuterol for Quarter Horses
The Quarter Horse Racing Committee voted 5-3 to recommend
amending the ARCI model rule to prohibit the bronchodilator Clenbuterol in
Quarter Horse and mixed-breed races, with testing in blood serum and plasma,
urine and hair permitted. The recommendation now goes to the Drug Testing
Standards and Practices Committee for consideration, then the Model Rules
Committee and ultimately the ARCI board, if approved at each step.
Clenbuterol is a useful therapeutic medication to treat
respiratory ailments, but its abuse to build muscle mass sparked American
Quarter Horse Association officials to request that it be completely banned in
their breed. The abuse is not seen with Thoroughbreds, for which such muscle
build-up could impede running that breed’s longer distances, officials said.
The AQHA officials requested that the rule be breed-specific.
“We don’t feel it is our job to take it away from other breeds,” said Janet
VanBebber, the AQHA’s chief racing officer. “But we readily acknowledge that
there is abuse within our breed of the sport.”
The three racing jurisdictions voting against the recommendation
said they thought it should be banned for all breeds.
