Horse Racing Has Bred Itself Into Obsolescence...
Bigalke said 05/17, 02:37 AM
The Preakness will be run this week at Pimlico in Baltimore. Big Brown, the Kentucky Derby champ, will line up at the start. Regardless the result, though, the "sport of kings" has lost its allure. The tragic death of Eight Belles @ Churchill Downs underscores the widespread weakness in racing...
Why? Horse racing has a longer American history than most any other sport. Past champions such as Seabiscuit & Seattle Slew & Secretariat are revered by the public, while a horse must die these days (see: Eight Belles, Barbaro) to garner any public sympathy...
There are 11 Triple Crown winners in history. However, the last came in 1978 with Steve Cauthen riding Affirmed. Why hasn't anyone turned the Triple since?
The biggest dilemma with horse racing is that horses are no longer bred to race multiple times. 2-year-olds are held back for their one big opportunity, their fragile bodies unable to handle the strain of too many passes on the track. Why haven't we seen a Triple Crown in 30 years? Horses these days are too specialized to handle 3 races in 5 weeks... the lust for a big winner has created Faberge eggs out of thoroughbreds...
Breeding is to blame for horse racing's demise...
steelfan82 said 05/17, 03:24 AM
So let me get this straight horse racing is obsolete because a horse hasn't won the triple crown in 30 years?
Didn't you say that horse racing has a longer history than most American sports? And yet only 11 horses have ever won a triple crown.
If it is dead now because no one has one the triple crown in 30 years why not say it died in 1973 when there was a 25 year period with out a triple crown winner.
Only 11 horses have one the triple crown because it is not an easy task. This is why it is so prestigious. None of the three races are the same they differ in distances from Preakness at 1 3/16 mile to Belmont at 1 1/2 mile. The difference might not seem like a lot but it really comes down to pacing the horse so they don't get burnt out on the 1 1/2 Belmont or blown away on the 1 3/16 Preakness.
As someone who just became old enough to gamble and therefore just became interested in the sport I will not call myself an expert by any means but I think I can say it is far from obsolete.
Out of room will continue next argument.
Bigalke said 05/17, 10:18 AM
No... if you had read the ENTIRETY of my first argument, horse racing is becoming obsolete because thoroughbred bloodlines are breaking down. The continued breeding of genetically-weaker traits in an all-consuming quest for SPEED, rather than other traits like stamina or endurance, has watered down horse breeding to the point where the animals are simply too fragile for the demands being asked of them...
I've followed these races long before I could bet on them. Nowadays, horses are not run as much in pre-Derby racing. Why? Because these creatures have a finite number of races in their legs due to breeding for certain characteristics over others. How many horses can even manage to LINE UP for all three races, much less win them?
Very few...
Secretariat, the great Triple Crown champion, had nine races as a two-year-old... whereas NONE of the horses at the start of the Derby had raced more than EIGHT before their first Triple Crown race. Because horses lack the durability to race more frequently, the public is less disposed to become enamored with horses it hardly knows. Where three races in 5 weeks used to be a relaxing pace, now it is a death march for these thoroughbreds...
steelfan82 said 05/18, 11:10 AM
Forfeited Turn
Bigalke said 05/18, 11:21 AM
See comments below for part one of my closing statement...
As for part two, it is simple: thoroughbred racing is predicated on champion horses being mated to produce more champion horses. However, horse racing has followed a trend in the past several decades to forgo stamina and endurance in breeding to focus on all-consuming speed. Horses nowadays cannot race nearly as many races as their predecessors, and the five weeks of the Triple Crown race -- which once were viewed as a LONG break between races -- is now seen as a game of Russian roulette with brittle-boned quadrupeds. At any given moment the stresses of such speed and the lack of endurance & recovery yield an Eight Belles moment when everyone is forced to confront the damage wrought by irresponsible breeding...
Individual horses might win races and perhaps even the Triple Crown (Big Brown is on his way after winning the Preakness yesterday)... but this is not nearly enough to save a sport in peril. Until the skeleton in the closet that is weakened racing-equine bloodlines is confronted and corrected, thoroughbred racing will continue to breed itself into obsolescence...
steelfan82 said 05/19, 12:10 PM
Forfeited Turn
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Comments (10)
I certainly didn't expect the Newbie to give the Galloping Bigalke such a wicked crack with the crop so soon. Pretty good argument. Of course I'll wait...
Faberge egg...that's good.
Baun-ded | 05/17/08, 07:22 AM
Report Offensive CommentNice arguments on both sides, as always I'll wait though.
Mets Fan: 1-0 BABY!!!!!!!!! | 05/17/08, 07:28 AM
Report Offensive CommentA horse could win the Triple Crown each year for the next ten years and it STILL would not fix the irreparable damage which has been wrought on horse bloodlines...
Bigalke | 05/17/08, 11:30 AM
Report Offensive CommentOop...The Galloping Bigalke throws a vicious faberge egg and scrambles the competition, spurring a head to head race!
Baun-ded | 05/17/08, 11:31 AM
Report Offensive CommentBigLake, your comment goes against what you write....im confused....isn't it your point that horse breeding is only good for 1 or two races? but then you say that a horse could win the triple crown for 10 years and it wouldn't help? Would many people wanna breed with that horse that has been winning for 10 years straight?....
ill wait for further arguments...
Steveo16220 is a GGTK | 05/17/08, 01:45 PM
Report Offensive CommentOn a Bigalke TD you better wait for the arguments Steveo...unless you want a faberge egg cracked over your head.
Just my sense of things anyway...However, being that it is 1-4 for some reason...I'll let it be known I am leaning left at this point.
Baun-ded | 05/17/08, 02:00 PM
Report Offensive CommentBigLake, your comment goes against what you write....im confused....isn't it your point that horse breeding is only good for 1 or two races? but then you say that a horse could win the triple crown for 10 years and it wouldn't help? Would many people wanna breed with that horse that has been winning for 10 years straight?....
ill wait for further arguments...
Steveo16220 says:walk the line | 05/17/08, 01:45 PM
Steveo...
Just to clarify things for you, what I meant was that a DIFFERENT horse could win the Triple Crown for ten consecutive years -- seeing as how even the most durable thoroughbreds usually have a racing life of two to three years... not every athlete can compete forever, after all. If a horse COULD compete for ten straight years and dominate the sport, that undoubtedly would be the sire of a lifetime... and quite possibly the first billion-dollar horse...
Since I'm short on getting argumentation in the throwdown itself (defend yourself, steelfan!) itself, I'll go further in this comment by steveo. Because the problem with horse racing is inherently that inbreeding has produced a generation of horses cross-bred in a manner which favors speed at the behest of an all-around build for racing. Horses are being bred to be as lithe as possible; it is no wonder that Barbaro had damaged feet and Eight Belles' ankles snapped. As the trend inevitably continues -- after all, where's the studs to send horse racing on a different path? -- horses become weaker and weaker, the bloodline unfortified by any more robust stock...
Horses will always be able to compete as long as there is interest; and in certain regions of the world there always will be. The Triple Crown will continue to race their quirky schedule, or perhaps they will adjust the dates if not the lengths of the individual races to better conform to the stamina concerns in the crop of racers. But, even if the highly unlikely scenario were to emerge whereby a new champion emerged on the scene to sweep the Kentucky Derby, Belmont Stakes and Preakness Stakes every season for a decade, it would not change the fact that the bloodline is working its way toward its own destruction via unchecked and overemphasized traits...
Bigalke | 05/18/08, 03:04 AM
Report Offensive Commentcrop of racers...Well said.
Vote left...right blew is and fumbled down the stretch run!
Baun-ded | 05/18/08, 12:20 PM
Report Offensive CommentPeople love horseracing in Bmore county
MDPRIDE111 | 05/19/08, 05:06 PM
Report Offensive CommentThis isn't a matter of whether or not PEOPLE love horse racing, MDPRIDE... this is a matter of whether or not there will be capable horses to contest races in the next twenty years. As bloodlines (and the horses themselves) are thinned down, thoroughbreds come closer to being unable to race on legs too weak to support their muscular frames... people will continue to enjoy racing, but they might not have sufficient numbers of racing horses to actually HAVE races...
Bigalke | 05/19/08, 09:43 PM
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