Quote:
Originally Posted by thespaah
Wait...I'm having a bit of trouble understanding the above. Are you claiming that Laurel management was more or less coercing horsemen to ship to Colonial under threat of losing stalls at Laurel? I'm really confused here.
|
Not more or less. Totally, completely and watching your move with each horse and where they went to run like a hawk. They checked the stable gate Ins and Outs of all horses daily.
Management closely monitored the empty stalls and ship outs. And while they do need to see what's going on ( I wish they had done it years earlier detecting who was cheating but that's for another day) with stalls to stay on top of it, the Colonial fiasco early on was over the top with veiled threats as to running when and where. Suggesting that they could run elsewhere, like Delaware Park if an equal type race was being run at Colonial was not much of an option unless you wanted blow back from management.
To some degree this has gone on since the beginning of racing. It's part of the politics and I certainly get that, but it was severe during the Colonial start up years and brutal on the stable employees and horses. Not necessarily the better horses who could afford to have their private van but the bread and butter horses and workers that raced in the cheaper races. The maiden claimers, nw/2 for 7,500, etc. Those owners were not going to want to pay for a private van and extra help. The economics did not make that realistic.
