Alan Truex: Belinda Stronach brings radical reform to Santa Anita

LLANO, Texas — Princess Lili B, 3-year-old filly who was euthanized last week at Santa Anita Park, may turn out to be horse racing’s greatest martyr.  She gave her life for the cause of equine safety. When she stumbled during a training session last Thursday and fractured both her front legs, the CEO of the racetrack, Belinda Stronach, said, “It’s beyond heart-breaking.”

Stronach is a tough woman.  In litigation she’s been battling her father, 86-year-old Frank Stronach, for control of the family’s Canadian-based entertainment/real estate conglomerate.  She could deal with her father accusing her of embezzlement but cannot bear the responsibility of guiding a business that’s more dedicated to healthy profits than to healthy horses.

So when Lili B became the 22nd horse in four months to die at Santa Anita, Stronach instituted revolutionary change for the Sport of Kings, which over the past 70 years has drifted into a cesspool of drugs and scandals.  More recently it’s become the scourge of People for Ethical Treatment of Animals.

So Stronach announced that henceforth Santa Anita will be racing with “international rules.”  A few highlights:

• Medications can be administered to horses only by state-licensed veterinarians, and no meds on race day.  
• Trainers must apply to work a horse at least 48 hours in advance.  One of the reasons for Santa Anita’s extraordinary fatality rate is thought to be the overtraining of its horses: They average 3.05 works per race – three times the number at other tracks.  Under the new protocol, trainers can be denied a workout if the racing office doubts the animal’s health.
• The Stronach Group is investing in the most advanced technology to assess the horses’ condition.  Race track officials, veterinarians and scientists will be spending more time in the barns. And the track is promising to find new homes for horses that are not fit to race.  No more run-em-till-they-drop.
• All horses born after 2019 will be barred from Lasix, which clearly is a performance-enhancer.  That’s why The Daily Racing Form prominently notes “first-time Lasix.”   Horses born before 2019 can continue to use the drug, but the maximum amount has been reduced 50%.

As with all reforms, there are complaints of too much too soon.  John Sadler, one of Santa Anita’s leading trainers, said this “big mistake” will send trainers fleeing to other tracks.

But Stronach is on the right side of history.  Gary Stevens, retired Hall of Fame jockey, told the Southern California News Group: “I’m in favor of the international rules.  . . . I know horses can perform at their top level without Lasix.”

Perhaps the horses that bleed without the diuretic drug should not be running, just as football players who can’t add muscle without the aid of steroids should not play football.  

Jim Gagliano, president of The Jockey Club, pointed out that in countries operating under racing’s international rules, “the rate of injury is less than half that of North America.  Our low standards and uneven rules remain a major weakness for the sport.”

The most questionable of Stronach’s reforms is the banning of whips in races.  About a decade ago jockeys switched to a foam-cushioned “riding crop” that delivers a noisy but painless whack.  Jockeys often use their whips in the stretch, thumping the left side or the right to keep a horse on a straight path.  Not good when they veer into the rail or into the path of other horses.

Many horse owners and trainers attribute Santa Anita’s tragedy to one factor: 15 inches of rain in three months.

That makes sense to me, living on a horse-and-cattle farm in usually arid Central Texas that last fall suffered through a 3-month monsoon very much like SoCal’s.  My home town was on national news for the first time ever when a century-old bridge was dramatically swept away by a suddenly swollen and fierce Llano River.

After a month of peaceful sunshine I walked onto my land and found it dry and solid.  But an hour later my pickup bogged down in the dirt road that seemed firm when I had tested it with my boots.   

Stronach thinks she has the timing figured out, the weather back to sunny norms and ground firming up.  So she scheduled the reopening of her track on March 29 – two weeks ahead of its eponymous showcase, the Santa Anita Derby.

I suspect wishful thinking, that strip of oval racetrack in LA being not yet as sturdy as it should be, given the loosening caused by excessive rain combined with the daily pounding of dozens of horses weighing a ton apiece.  

John Veitch, retired Hall of Fame trainer, told Mark Whicker of the Los Angeles Daily News: “I still think it’s the track and the abnormal winter.  They’re going to have to go down to the foundation and tear down that whole track.”

That racetrack was not built for the traffic that’s increased since Hollywood Park closed for good in 2013.

Of course, it would be utterly uncapitalistic for Stronach to shut down her business until all the science is in and the track’s foundation bolstered.

And you can argue that it’s in the animals’ interest to work at Santa Anita, instead of being vanned for hours over LA freeways to alternative training destinations, of which there are few in the area.  Much different story in the lush, soft ground of Kentucky, Florida and Louisiana.

Stronach, formerly a member of Canada’s Parliament, believes Santa Anita’s failure should be blamed on others besides Mother Nature.  The racetrack baron (owner of Pimlico, home of the Preakness) agrees with PETA that horses are put under too much stress, often with pharmaceutical stimulants, to run when they should be resting.

Here’s hoping more reforms will come.  Perhaps they can lead to a rebirth of a sport that in the 1950s rivaled baseball and boxing as America’s favorites.

The racetrack offered family entertainment and outdoor exercise, traipsing from paddock to finish line.  Children love horses, but we don’t want them to see horses dying. The public lost faith in horse racing, as it did in boxing, another sport that refuses to govern itself.  Stevens pleads: “At some point we need a national commissioner.”

Until that happens, Belinda Stronach, perhaps flawed but certainly bold and feisty, will have to do.  I’d like to think she will not forget Princess Lili B.