oscar barrera
 

was having a discussion w an old time Finger Lakes trainer now at Delaware about Oscar and his "winning ways." I said that (remembering what i'd read in Len Ragozin's book) after OB was nailed and served a long suspension he returned to the track and saddled something like 90 straight losers. The trainer contradicted me and said that Oscar was never suspended at all.
Anybody know?

We also discussed the many theories surrounding Oscar's wild ride and I said that I'd heard that it all involved tongue ties. The trainer told me that he'd heard the same thing and that Oscar was dipping the the tongue ties in nitroglycerine. OK...to anticipate comment... the horses EXPLODED on the track...but , as I'm neither a chemist or a trainer... what would nitro do?

oops...
 

meant to post to handicapping board

blow you to smithereins

I don't remember Oscar ever being suspended.It seems to us that he got caught and was basically told to stop.That was the end of the ride.It ended just as mysteriously as it began.One thing about Oscar,at least his moves were easy to detect.What I find interesting about the "juice trainers"is how they suddenly stop winning and just become your run of the mill bad trainer.In NY there are plenty who had some kind of run and our now either gone or mediocre.See names like Peter Ferriola,Juan Serey,Mitchell Freidman and even Gasper Moschera who runs very few horses these days.

Juicers
 

10-15 years ago, trainers were limited in the choices of juice available, usually morphine derivatives- which were detectable in the testing shed at Aqueduct.

When Amicar came in it was expensive, but undetectable, since it was burned up, like a sugar, during the course of the race- leaving no chemical fingerprint. The richer trainers jumped on Amicar as though it was a virgin at a Hell's Angels' picnic.

Except in Kentucky- where you could "run what you brung",(as well as some of the bullring tracks- the scandal level rose to the point where some outcry had to be made, simply on the basis of common decency, and the major tracks started threatening the juicers with the spectre of being denied barn space for the next meet. NYRA, to their credit, even kicked a major trainer out, one recent winter.That guy wound up at Last Hope Downs- in the South- and went from a string of 110 horses, to having to quit the game, such are the brutal economics of the racing business.

Meanwhile, the charade continues, as we see in the press, even Hall of Fame conditioners are succumbing to the pressure and are getting set down. Can't blame the Trainers in a way, they are just trying to survive in a tough arena. A man is likely to do anything to feed his family.

Too bad, though, cause cheating has cast a pall over the game, and I am sorry to say has helped those devils, the casinos.

The past 20 years has seen a horrible erosion of horse racing, and I wish we could stop it. Bringing in the slots may wind up being the end, I'm afraid. But, it must be done, to get the purses up and to spur more racing.

All the best,

Jaguar

Jag
Got to take issue with your amicar assessment. In the NY harness industry this year there have been a handful of amicar (real name aminocaproic acid) post race positives called and punishment doled out. So amicar doesn't just disappear during the running of a race. Also, amicar is one of the lowest class drugs (similar to salix, lasix or furosemide) according to the Associations of Racing Commissioners International. (ARCI).

Amicar
 

Figman, quite so. But, the point I was trying to make is that when Amicar came in, the testers weren't picking it up. American Turf ran an informative piece on Amicar use some years ago. Alot of trainers made alot of money with it, and alot of bettors lost alot of money because of it.

No doubt, since the chemical tests have become more sophisticated, the juicers will have to go back to the lab.

All the best,

Jaguar

Oscar
 

I remeber the Oscar days well. He would cliam a horse and run it back as fast as possible and win. The old joke was that a NY trainer looking thorugh the DRF had a horse entered in the second race, then he noticed that Oscar had the same horse entered in the ninth!
Seriously, thjough, the NY trainer situation is bizzare. To me, it is just not possible that a guy can win 30% and keep finding out what makes losers win big then suddenly go stone cold. It is much more believable that his magic juicegot discovered and taken away. It amkes me sick that NY officials just don't give a damn about the bettors and never publicize what happens for fear of a bad image. The lead trainer at NYRA years ago was caught using illegal turn downs and his comment was that he looks out for best interest his horses and owners and didn't care if it was illegal. This is a very well know trainer and I think he should have been given a liftime suspension. Instead, he still baths in glory and even had a book written about what a great trainer he is!
To me NYRA is the most minor league racing circuit anywhere.
Bar none.

Re: Oscar , Oscar, Oscar
 

Sorry to break the news to you guys, but the Oscar Barrera at Finger Lakes, Delaware is Oscar Barrera Junior. Oscar S. Barrera the famed trainer from the major N.Y. circuit died many years ago.

Oscar and Oscar
 

Yeah, that's the one I meant.
Jr. at Deleware? Didn't know that. Knew was at FL for a while.

A misunderstanding...I was referring to Oscar Sr. Oscar Jr. has never started a horse at Delaware as far as I know.

But while we're on the subject of juice...remember the Breeders Cup at Belmont last year? A jock agent told me that the state police were all over Belmont due to 9/11. If you injected a horse, the staties collected the syringe and put it in a plastic bag with the vet/trainers name on it. I don't think they were looking for terrorists. True? I don't know, but I remember that before the first race on the card, a pretty ordinary affair, there were late scratches galore. I think it went off with 4 or 5 horses.

AMICAR????
 

JAGUAR,

Can you tell us more about amicar and how it works or were I might read about it.

Delayjf

Blood Horse did a story on Amicar I think.

Amicar
 

Delayjf,

Amicar appeared on the racing scene out of the blue in the late 90's, probably mentioned in the racing press for the first time around '97 or so.

We knew something was going on, because our good old form-cycle charts suddenly turned into waste paper, -which were probably re-cycled as McDonald's menus.

I used my reliable old workout chart, which I carried with me every day to OTB, in its plastic cover- to start a campfire. 'Cause if a 15-month layoff nag can come back to the circuit- showing 3 or 4 modest works- and can win gate-to-wire against veteran horses- it means I have to turn in my Handicapper's license, since I obviously have learned nothing in over 20 years at this game.

So, drugs have re-written the handicapping manual, and now connections are seriously important, since correct trainer/jockey charts often reveal when a conditioner is cracking down in a Maiden Special Weight, Allowance, and sometimes in an Optional.

In other words, I have retired a few Speed and Pace discs, and while those factors are vital in reaching a betting decision, the connections factor is now the decision-maker(assuming all other essential factors indicate the mount is ready to take the money today).

Rumor hath it that Amicar was used by the Russians and their Eastern European patsies in several olympics, and that American athletes were known to have experimented with it.

The best discussion of Amicar- as it relates to horse racing- was the American Turf article. The DRF and NYRA have pretty much kept hands off, and I don't blame them for skirting the issue, even though I don't agree with that approach.

In a sport involving public trust, I think it is a dereliction of responsibilty not to throw a bright light on widespread cheating.

Since the State and our elected officials won't do it, it is incumbent upon those charged with supervision of racing, such as HBPA, track management, the NTRA, etc., to take their heads out of the sand and try to restore a modicum of dignity and honesty to the game. Stealing from the bettors has already contributed to a decline in on-track attendance, and in some venues has caused tracks to close, as- for example- happened at Centennial Downs in Denver, in 1980, when the State Attorney General threatened to indict the whole cabal.

It's no secret that the casinos are causing tracks to fail, and that bringing in slots is a last, desperate attempt to shore up the dam before the whole thing falls apart for good(due to the high cost of operating a track and the low rate of return.)

Our brother PA contributor, Figman, has a good command of chemistry and could very likely fill you in.

All the best,

Jaguar

Cash,

People with heart trouble take nitro, so my guess, totally a guess, would be that nitro would affect a horse's heart rate. People slip it under the tongue in tablet form, so it would make sense to put it on a tongue tie for a horse, presumably to get it into the system fast.