Presenting data Oct. 16 during a meeting of the California Horse Racing Board in Sacramento, Calif., CHRB equine medical director Dr. Jeff Blea said regulatory protections for spotlighted aspects of horse welfare are working well in the state.
Blea pointed to statistics from fiscal year 2024-25 in California about horses scratched in the post parade and those horses whose claims were voided due to unsoundness in support of his position. He compared these runners to cohorts—similar horses but those not falling in these groups of perceived unsoundness.
In discussing those scratched in the post parade, he said such a "horse took an average of 43 days to work back, whereas a cohort worked back on average in 22 days. Essentially, it took twice as long, or three weeks, for the post parade-scratched horse to work back. More interestingly, the post parade-scratched horses took an average of 108 days to return to the races versus an average of 39 days, or approximately 10 weeks longer to race, than their cohorts."
As for those whose claims were voided—representing 13% of all claims, Blea continued, "Voided claims took an average of 148 days to return to the races versus an average of 28 days for their cohorts." He mentioned that 46% of voided claims had yet to return to the races by Oct. 1 of this year.
In a follow-up interview Oct. 17 with BloodHorse, Blea said his remarks were well received by the board and that one of the principal takeaways is that regulatory scratches are "not made frivolously and that they are in fact warranted, especially related to post-parade scratches and voided claims."
Trainers do not always agree, and have the benefit of being around their horses daily. It is the rare athlete—equine or human—that does not experience occasional aches or inflammation from physical activity.
Blea's remarks come at a time when CHRB, track, and Breeders' Cup veterinarians will soon be tasked with overseeing the safety of the equine participants at the Oct. 31-Nov. 1 Breeders' Cup at Del Mar in what they describe as a collective effort with owners, trainers, and racetrack-practicing veterinarians. Breeders' Cup horses are monitored in training and regularly examined at their barns.
"We tend to see more high-profile scratches and owners and trainers pushing back pretty hard and saying that their horses (are fine) and it was the wrong scratch," CHRB executive director Scott Chaney said in regard to the Breeders' Cup in comments made following Blea's Thursday presentation. "So I appreciate Dr. Blea doing all the work. I know Santa Anita has some pretty compelling numbers as well. Really what they all point to is that the regulatory events are extremely good at identifying high risk horses. There's just no other way around it."
Blea said Friday that his data did not examine the time away from exercise or racing of those who were prerace veterinary scratches, made either the morning of the race or in the lead-up to a race. Trainer-initiated scratches still comprise the highest percentages of scratches.
Last year, two-time California Horse of the Year The Chosen Vron was placed on the "vet's list," a listing of horses ineligible to compete, for unsoundness ahead of the 2024 Breeders' Cup Sprint (G1), and others became official veterinarian scratches after entry, including some that had been sent all the way from Europe.
The Chosen Vron, unraced since last summer, was retired from racing this March.
"Even talking to my other counterparts, they get way more pushback around the country on regulatory vet scratches than we do, because I think we have experienced a bit of a cultural change here, and people understand it a little bit more," Chaney said.
There is a "tremendous shortage" of regulatory veterinarians across the country, Blea told the CHRB. However, he stated Friday that he did not view this as responsible for the longer return-to-exercise periods for the studied horses in California. For removal from a vet's list, a horse typically has to work and be reevaluated by a regulatory veterinarian.
Gary Fenton, chair of the Thoroughbred Owners of California, has also experienced disappointment with a regulatory veterinarian's scratches of horses within his racing stable. He and Billy Koch are the managing partners of Little Red Feather Racing, California's largest Thoroughbred racing partnership.
"Over the years, Little Red Feather has experienced three or four instances in which one of our horses was scratched by the regulatory veterinarians," he noted. "Each time, the trainer was adamant that there was 'not a pimple on the horse.' Nonetheless, I encouraged diagnostic testing. The diagnostics revealed an underlying issue in each case.
"Our trainers do an exceptional job. The reality is that veterinary science and screening protocols have advanced significantly. These enhanced measures, working in concert with the skill and dedication of our trainers, have produced an unprecedented era of safety within our sport."
Looking ahead, Blea said artificial intelligence is "being looked at" in combination with wearable technology sensors.
"Another avenue is our gait analysis objective tools like the Sleip app, which we are about to go live with in California, to give us an objective tool when we evaluate that horse, especially at a trot, to see what that horse's gait looks like," Blea said during the CHRB meeting. "With an objective tool (we can) turn around and say, 'Not only are we providing a subjective analysis based on years of experience, data, history, but we're now adding objectivity to our examination,' which I think is critically important."
Blea added Friday that he could not provide a specific start date for the Sleip app while awaiting state and CHRB approval. He said the Sleip app's gait analysis would be horse-specific, flagging aberrations from gaits earlier exhibited by the horse. Plans call for it to be gradually introduced as a tool for regulatory veterinarians, beginning with postrace and training soundness examinations and out-of-competition exams.
"It's a tool. It doesn't replace what you're seeing as a clinician," he said.
