Some comments.
Q: The CTT and the TOC’s push back against these new rules has been described as obstructionism and an attempt to shield cheaters. What is your position on OOC testing? Are you against its expansion in California?
A: Any suggestion that the TOC or the CTT condone cheating is patently preposterous. Both organizations, in writing and verbally, have made very clear that we are in favor of out-of-competition testing. We always have.
Great answer.
You can say and write whatever the appropriate response should be. The thing is you have to eventually back up these statements by actions. So far, the only action you have shown is the opposition to the rules that are trying to be implemented.
Q: You’ve pinpointed a number of things you consider wrong with the proposed rules, including who is ultimately responsible for the horse when it’s outside a licensed facility. Can you summarize your position on this?
A: The language they’ve come up with to hold either the owner or the trainer responsible outside of the enclosure is something that needs a lot more work.
Now your getting somewhere, you oppose the rules because it would hold the trainers and owners responsible. Hmmm, really? I have a idea, just type a form that states once a horse leaves a "secured facility" Richard Dutrow is responsible for the horse and all your problems are solved. You are the same people that pushed the wording that allows owners to transfer a horse from a suspended trainer so it could race, and basically stopped suspension from being a punishment. If owners and trainers are not responsible for the horse, there is no way to stop cheating.
Q: So, why haven’t you delivered already a blueprint outlining what you would like to see in place, regarding the precision tracking of horses?
A: That’s why we’ve asked for working group meetings to brainstorm this problem. Are the racetracks really on top of the horses on the ground? They’re supposed to be, but they, generally speaking, aren’t. And any kind of flaw in the system can be exploited by cheaters. We don’t want the cheaters to be able to exploit the loopholes in the rules to get away with cheating — in the worst possible case, the horse being sent some place for a cheating procedure.
You want to talk about this for a
long time. Delay, delay, delay. You don't want the cheaters to be able to exploit the loopholes? Sounds like you want to write the rules in a way so that the trainers and owners have loopholes so they are not responsible. And by the way, "cheaters" and "trainers and owners" are not two separate groups. There is only one group, trainers and owners. It just happens that some of the trainers and owners are cheaters.
Q: Okay, so what workable, tangible differences to what’s in the proposed rules could you consider being implemented?
A: We need to conquer the problem about how to determine when a horse is leaving the grounds and where its destination is. I can easily see some kind of methodology in terms of responsibility, some methodology of saying, ‘from this point forward, this horse is under the responsibility of x person.’
When a horse is leaving the grounds is a problem? This is the day the horse is loaded into a van, not to hard to figure this out. Where the horse is going is hard to figure out? This is where the above mentioned van stops and unloads the horse. Some methodology of saying, ‘from this point forward, this horse is under the responsibility of x person.’? You mean you want to be able to say who the "cheater" is, as long as it is not the trainer or owner.
