Indulto
02-27-2008, 02:32 PM
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hDj5LVHCnVsAmCOgXbxYsR4Lc8AwD8UR2NEG0 (http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hDj5LVHCnVsAmCOgXbxYsR4Lc8AwD8UR2NEG0)
Thoroughbred Chief to Address Steroids
By JEFFREY McMURRAY … The president of the National Thoroughbred Racing Association has agreed to testify in front of a House panel investigating the effects of performance-enhancing drugs.
Although most of the focus to date has been on baseball and other team sports, thoroughbred racing also is trying to enact a national ban on steroids, at least for the days leading up to races.
"I think the perception is drug use in racing is worse now than maybe it's ever been," said Rep. Ed Whitfield, R-Ky. "There have been many individual veterinarians, prominent breeders and owners who are quite frustrated."
… While Waldrop and other racing officials have spoken with lawmakers on Capitol Hill, the hearing will provide a more public approach to addressing the issue. Waldrop said it is the first time an NTRA official has testified before Congress on the issue.
Last year, a trade association that represents state horse racing commissions agreed to a model rule that calls for steroid testing to be adopted nationwide no later than December 2008. While the stipulation likely won't immediately provide a blanket ban on steroids, the tests will be designed to make sure horses didn't receive injections within at least a month before a race.
Scot Waterman, executive director of the Racing Medication and Testing Consortium, said steroid shots once were relatively common and somewhat benign, providing a one-time jolt to horses that weren't responding well to training. Now, some trainers are trying to put the animals through steroid regimens that could affect competition and ultimately harm the animals, Waterman said. …What prompted this post was a letter to Waldrop I just saw on the “Derby List” forum:
http://www.ssimr.com/posts/89019.html (http://www.ssimr.com/posts/89019.html)
… I have followed the baseball scandals closely. My hat is off to baseball management for their expensive and painstaking pursuit of performance enhancers. I believe that drug use in baseball pales in comparison to that of racing. Yet racing, with its many factions, each screaming for revenue, each trying to seduce the marquee stables and trainers, conjures up an image of a third world redlight district. As new sources of revenue emerge, track management appears like a multi-headed ostrich, each head casting about for the next pile of casino dollars to bury itself in. In the meantime, the game erodes in a flood of juice which threatens to alter the thoroughbred racing landscape into isolated islands of slot machines.
… I am writing in the hope that you will invite the same investigatory bodies which were successful in baseball to do for racing that which racing cannot,or will not, do for itself.
Thoroughbred Chief to Address Steroids
By JEFFREY McMURRAY … The president of the National Thoroughbred Racing Association has agreed to testify in front of a House panel investigating the effects of performance-enhancing drugs.
Although most of the focus to date has been on baseball and other team sports, thoroughbred racing also is trying to enact a national ban on steroids, at least for the days leading up to races.
"I think the perception is drug use in racing is worse now than maybe it's ever been," said Rep. Ed Whitfield, R-Ky. "There have been many individual veterinarians, prominent breeders and owners who are quite frustrated."
… While Waldrop and other racing officials have spoken with lawmakers on Capitol Hill, the hearing will provide a more public approach to addressing the issue. Waldrop said it is the first time an NTRA official has testified before Congress on the issue.
Last year, a trade association that represents state horse racing commissions agreed to a model rule that calls for steroid testing to be adopted nationwide no later than December 2008. While the stipulation likely won't immediately provide a blanket ban on steroids, the tests will be designed to make sure horses didn't receive injections within at least a month before a race.
Scot Waterman, executive director of the Racing Medication and Testing Consortium, said steroid shots once were relatively common and somewhat benign, providing a one-time jolt to horses that weren't responding well to training. Now, some trainers are trying to put the animals through steroid regimens that could affect competition and ultimately harm the animals, Waterman said. …What prompted this post was a letter to Waldrop I just saw on the “Derby List” forum:
http://www.ssimr.com/posts/89019.html (http://www.ssimr.com/posts/89019.html)
… I have followed the baseball scandals closely. My hat is off to baseball management for their expensive and painstaking pursuit of performance enhancers. I believe that drug use in baseball pales in comparison to that of racing. Yet racing, with its many factions, each screaming for revenue, each trying to seduce the marquee stables and trainers, conjures up an image of a third world redlight district. As new sources of revenue emerge, track management appears like a multi-headed ostrich, each head casting about for the next pile of casino dollars to bury itself in. In the meantime, the game erodes in a flood of juice which threatens to alter the thoroughbred racing landscape into isolated islands of slot machines.
… I am writing in the hope that you will invite the same investigatory bodies which were successful in baseball to do for racing that which racing cannot,or will not, do for itself.