By Mike Beas
Fri, May 16 2008
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ANDERSON — Dan Eichhorn was watching Saturday’s Kentucky Derby on television when his admiration of one gifted thoroughbred race horse immediately gave way to sorrow for another.
By winning in impressive fashion, Big Brown strode across the finish line as a legitimate threat to become horse racing’s first Triple Crown winner since Affirmed in 1978.
Then the television cameras did their job, and the celebratory mood was split-second brief.
Derby runner-up Eight Belles lay injured after breaking both front ankles. Eichhorn, the director of veterinary services at Hoosier Park, felt his heart sink.
“You just hang your head; it’s one of the sad parts of racing,” Eichhorn said. “I can’t say there is a person out there who doesn’t hurt when that happens.
“I wasn’t there,” he added, “but my assumption is that (Eight Belles) may have stumbled with one foot, caught herself with the other foot and broke it.”
Because it has been a mega-watt event on the American sports landscape for generations, the Kentucky Derby revealed the uncertainties of horse racing in front of millions of viewers.
There is risk, more so for thoroughbreds than standardbreds.
“Thoroughbreds are so much more muscular, they run so much faster and they are fine-boned,” said Eichhorn, noting that thoroughbreds race at approximately 40 miles per hour compared to 30 for standardbreds.
“They are taller horses, putting much more power into their strides, and they’re bred that way. We rarely have problems such as these in standardbred.”
Nonetheless, when a horse experiences a premature demise, everyone who owns, trains, races or simply appreciates the animal’s competitive streak feels loss.
Eight Belles is simply the latest high-profile race horse to be euthanized because of injury during competition. There have been others, including 2006 Kentucky Derby winner Barbaro.
Most, however, depart at smaller venues with far less fanfare.
Tuesday, Larry Jones, the man who trained Eight Belles, ordered drug testing as part of the thoroughbred’s autopsy as a means to cease speculation the horse may have been on steroids.
Such controversies persist in competitive horse racing the way they do in more mainstream athletic endeavors such as football and baseball.
“I hate the tragedy of it, obviously, for the animal, and (horse racing) is so vulnerable about what people think of us as an industry,” said Ernie Gaskin, who trains standardbreds at his Crimson Lane Farm in Markleville.
“We’re attached to gambling, which creates a shroud, but when something like this happens, it’s another poke in the eye. I always worry about that.”
Yet in the end, a beautiful animal is lost. An investment. A friend.
“It’s tragic,” said Jim Shelton, who trains standardbred race horses at Hoosier Park. “Owners especially build a bond with their horses. It’s like a member of the family.”
Last summer, Shelton was competing at Indiana Downs in Shelbyville when his horse, Where Eagles Dare, shattered his front left ankle approximately one-16th of a mile from the finish line. Ultimately, the horse had to be euthanized.
“After 20 years in the business, you see a lot of things,” Shelton said. “The cruel thing about my business is that I’ve got to turn the page and go on. But it really does affect you for a few days. These horses ... they’re athletes. They have a desire to go, and they sometimes perform with pain.”
Other times, their passion for competition leaves human beings hurting inside.
“I actually have won money at a race where a horse broke down and I donated that money to a horse rescue,” said Indianapolis-based Jim Hartman, a member of Indiana’s Thoroughbred Advisory Committee. “I couldn’t win money that way, but that’s me.”
Hartman and his wife, Deb, own 11 thoroughbred race horses. One produced the filly, Alina, which came close to defeating Eight Belles during the latter’s Kentucky Derby prep race on April 6.
Come Derby Day, the Hartmans were pulling for, then grieving the loss of Eight Belles.
“My wife immediately started crying and probably didn’t stop for about 10 minutes,” said Hartman. “That shows the deep-rooted feelings we have for these animals.”
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