A horse race is a contest of speed among horses that either are ridden by jockeys or pull sulkies and their drivers. The sport of horse racing has undergone a great deal of change over the centuries from primitive contests of speed and stamina to a huge public entertainment business with immense sums of money involved, but the basic concept of the contest remains the same.
A horse’s health is of critical importance in any sports where it competes with other athletes. In a horse race, competitors must not only be fast, but they must also be healthy and injury free. This is especially important when a horse races against horses that are bred to have higher speed and heart rates, and are often forced to run at these higher speeds to win.
Fortunately, there are a growing number of people in the horse racing industry who see that equine welfare is of the utmost importance. However, many horse racing aficionados continue to berate animal rights activists and the general public for calling out the flaws of their system. This apathy is deplorable, and it’s time for horse racing to evolve from its current business model and do better at protecting the lives of its athletes.
One of the biggest issues facing horse racing is that it doesn’t have an adequate wraparound aftercare solution for horses once they leave the track. Once a thoroughbred leaves a track, it’s sold into an infinite number of situations where its future is entirely unpredictable. Most of these horses are bought for a fraction of their breeding value and are sold again and again until they are no longer profitable to the industry. They are then sold into a pipeline of uncertain outcomes, most of which result in them hemorrhaging into slaughter plants and being sold for meat.
One of the biggest problems with this haphazard structure is that horses are constantly sold into the most dangerous situations possible. As a result, countless horses are killed each year in racing. Whether they die from an injury suffered in a race or from being shot and dumped into the water, it is always horribly tragic. Until we can stop selling and buying these horses into the most brutal of situations, horse racing will never be truly safe for its athletes. Until then, the industry will remain in a state of perpetual crisis.