Quote:
Originally Posted by Thomas Roulston
How about splitting the difference and making it 10 pounds?
But the thing is that the new Lasix regulations don't affect claiming horses, who will continue to be able to use it. Only stakes and allowance horses are impacted - and what's wrong with running money-condition and open allowance races on a regular basis? Such races were run on such a basis when I became old enough to go to the track in the late '70s - so that trainers of Lasix-dependent horses are not forced to simply give them away. Isn't that more than enough of a penalty for using Lasix - having to run them in races with $90,000 purses in New York instead of $250,000 or even $500,000 purses in stakes races?
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Those races don't get written because they don't fill. Hard to imagine there would be enough horses to make them fill now. That is something for the racing secretary to figure out.
As I said, who knows on the best number. Maybe it is 10. But since clearly seven wasn't enough, I was looking for a little bigger bump than three more pounds.
To be clear, I'm not suggesting making it an option like it was in the Pegasus. I'm saying something like the conditions---121 pounds, if entered with Lasix, 133 pounds. Then after a year you analyze the data and see if you need to go up or down, but always leaning towards non-Lasix users when data is murky.
