training and vet bills

[lamboguy]

i have been running horses now for 30 years, and the 2 things i can tell you today is that training and vet bills have gone thru the roof and its alot tougher to win. i looked at my bills from new jersey, i paid trainers $75 a day and complained that that is to low for the job. vets charge $20 to administer lasix pre-race. they charge $260 for a months supply of clembuterol. $125 to tap a joint.
in pennsylvania and west virginia i am paying my trainers $50 a day for what i consider to be a better job than what i was getting in new jersey or new york.

pre-race lasix is $15, clem is $200, and i just tapped 2 joints in w.virginia for $50 each. i know that the tapping is a very low price. but there are big diferences. the purses are reletively the same if you are running at the lower levels in these 2 jurisdictions.

i wonder why average people like myself ever run in places like new york or new jersey. its not a game for us there. its for people that have lots of money that really don't care about it.

maybe that is part of the problem why race handles in new york are decreasing while mountaineer and penn national are on the increase.

eventually horse population in those tracks will decrease, you will see more 3+4 horse fields and the vets will be hustling to get the remaining business.

[supercap]

The problem with the vets is they dont get paid for an office visit. If they are not shooting needles they dont make money. It is rare to have a vet come and look at your horse and say " everything looks good".

[onefast99]

Originally Posted by lamboguy

i have been running horses now for 30 years, and the 2 things i can tell you today is that training and vet bills have gone thru the roof and its alot tougher to win. i looked at my bills from new jersey, i paid trainers $75 a day and complained that that is to low for the job. vets charge $20 to administer lasix pre-race. they charge $260 for a months supply of clembuterol. $125 to tap a joint.
in pennsylvania and west virginia i am paying my trainers $50 a day for what i consider to be a better job than what i was getting in new jersey or new york.

pre-race lasix is $15, clem is $200, and i just tapped 2 joints in w.virginia for $50 each. i know that the tapping is a very low price. but there are big diferences. the purses are reletively the same if you are running at the lower levels in these 2 jurisdictions.

i wonder why average people like myself ever run in places like new york or new jersey. its not a game for us there. its for people that have lots of money that really don't care about it.

maybe that is part of the problem why race handles in new york are decreasing while mountaineer and penn national are on the increase.

eventually horse population in those tracks will decrease, you will see more 3+4 horse fields and the vets will be hustling to get the remaining business.

Try running in Woodbine, $100 per day training, to scope a horse is $100 medications up there are about 45% higher then in the USA. This was over this past summer when the dollar hoovered around 1.08 vs the canadian dollar. And the trainers and vets bitched when you adjusted for the exchange rate. But I hear you on the costs in NJ and NY, maybe a bunch of us can get together and do a co-op with a decent trainer.

[Mineshaft]

Originally Posted by lamboguy

i have been running horses now for 30 years, and the 2 things i can tell you today is that training and vet bills have gone thru the roof and its alot tougher to win. i looked at my bills from new jersey, i paid trainers $75 a day and complained that that is to low for the job. vets charge $20 to administer lasix pre-race. they charge $260 for a months supply of clembuterol. $125 to tap a joint.
in pennsylvania and west virginia i am paying my trainers $50 a day for what i consider to be a better job than what i was getting in new jersey or new york.

pre-race lasix is $15, clem is $200, and i just tapped 2 joints in w.virginia for $50 each. i know that the tapping is a very low price. but there are big diferences. the purses are reletively the same if you are running at the lower levels in these 2 jurisdictions.

i wonder why average people like myself ever run in places like new york or new jersey. its not a game for us there. its for people that have lots of money that really don't care about it.

maybe that is part of the problem why race handles in new york are decreasing while mountaineer and penn national are on the increase.

eventually horse population in those tracks will decrease, you will see more 3+4 horse fields and the vets will be hustling to get the remaining business.

Agree 100%. Cali and NY are for the people who have tons of money. For me and you and the average Joe we have to watch every penny. Im in this business to make money not let it go down the toilet.

[ralph_the_cat]

no doubt... I often think that people that have horses in NY, CA, GP, and even KY need their head examined...

but the joints... you're only getting 50% HA with those $50 injections in WV, but I bet you're getting nearly 90% HA with those $125 injections... For me in WV/PA right now its $50-$60 for DEPO and $80-$90 for HA...

[proximity]

Originally Posted by lamboguy

i wonder why average people like myself ever run in places like new york or new jersey. .

you should just get david and stephanie to train all your horses!!

[westny]

Originally Posted by lamboguy

i have been running horses now for 30 years, and the 2 things i can tell you today is that training and vet bills have gone thru the roof and its alot tougher to win. i looked at my bills from new jersey, i paid trainers $75 a day and complained that that is to low for the job. vets charge $20 to administer lasix pre-race. they charge $260 for a months supply of clembuterol. $125 to tap a joint.
in pennsylvania and west virginia i am paying my trainers $50 a day for what i consider to be a better job than what i was getting in new jersey or new york.

pre-race lasix is $15, clem is $200, and i just tapped 2 joints in w.virginia for $50 each. i know that the tapping is a very low price. but there are big diferences. the purses are reletively the same if you are running at the lower levels in these 2 jurisdictions.

i wonder why average people like myself ever run in places like new york or new jersey. its not a game for us there. its for people that have lots of money that really don't care about it.

maybe that is part of the problem why race handles in new york are decreasing while mountaineer and penn national are on the increase.

eventually horse population in those tracks will decrease, you will see more 3+4 horse fields and the vets will be hustling to get the remaining business.

IN your posts in the Pletcher thread on the procaine bruhula, you brag how "Mizzen Mast never got steroids from his illustrious trainer" and you proselitize how "guys like Pletcher with his procaine nanogram overage is destroying the fertility of stallions with steroids". That is not a fact.

What is a FACT is that tapping the synovial ankle joints of race horses , LIKE YOU DO eventually DESTROYS THE cartiledge of the horse's joints.. Repeated taps, and the horse is a crippled arthritic. Can't walk. Can't graze.

You come across as a hypocrite. I'd rather steroids in my horse than crippling them as you do.

You a whiner too. You can't race horses in NY unless you have money. It costs 5OK a year to keep a horse with a NY trainer. Long gone is the era where small-fry owners like yourself can race in NY. As for the NYRA field size...you are clueless and you haven't watched a race in NY in eons...

To the contrary to what YOU would have posters think, NY consistently has 1-3 top dollar handles every day of all the tracks running. You should race your horses at Penn or MD where you'd have a chance...low cost and weak competition...

And the FACT that you cite Penn as taking business away from NYRA would be funny if it wasn't such a sad commentary on you. Penn...the track that is closing becasue the surface is so bad horses are dying.

[ralph_the_cat]

Originally Posted by westny

IN your posts in the Pletcher thread on the procaine bruhula, you brag how "Mizzen Mast never got steroids from his illustrious trainer" and you proselitize how "guys like Pletcher with his procaine nanogram overage is destroying the fertility of stallions with steroids". That is not a fact.

What is a FACT is that tapping the synovial ankle joints of race horses , LIKE YOU DO eventually DESTROYS THE cartiledge of the horse's joints.. Repeated taps, and the horse is a crippled arthritic. Can't walk. Can't graze.

You come across as a hypocrite. I'd rather steroids in my horse than crippling them as you do.

You a whiner too. You can't race horses in NY unless you have money. It costs 5OK a year to keep a horse with a NY trainer. Long gone is the era where small-fry owners like yourself can race in NY. As for the NYRA field size...you are clueless and you haven't watched a race in NY in eons...

To the contrary to what YOU would have posters think, NY consistently has 1-3 top dollar handles every day of all the tracks running. You should race your horses at Penn or MD where you'd have a chance...low cost and weak competition...

And the FACT that you cite Penn as taking business away from NYRA would be funny if it wasn't such a sad commentary on you. Penn...the track that is closing becasue the surface is so bad horses are dying.

I dont know Lambo or westny, but I will say that stating that tapping the horses ankle the way "he does" will damage the joint is a FACT is a bit off. Yes, using D.E.P.O. isnt the best way to to do a horses ankle but DEPO has a 50% mix of HA which helps support joint function... and Lambo stating that the ankle injections from his other trainer that costs $125, I can gaurantee you those are nearly 90-99% HA injections, which again, supports the joint in an extremely positive way... straight corti/steroid is harmful, but Lambo never suggested exactly what type of injection they are, so assuming that an "injection" in general is harmful is extremely inaccurate... you are just flat out wrong about ankle injections damaging the joint, it depends on which kind... If horses ankles were injected more often with HA, they would be better off... HA basically thickens the synovial fluid in the joint giving the horse more lub in his joint... you could say by tapping an ankle you are letting watery fluid out and putting top-notch grease in... the only ankle injection that causes problems are the corti/steriod injections... which are being used less and less... and will eventually be banned...

[lamboguy]

i thought it was called HCA, its supposedly the "good stuff". the last injection i have given this horse has lasted for 5 races already. i have injected his ankle. i plan on stopping with the horse the end of this month, and i am going to do another procedure called an I-wrap. it cost $1500 to do, and takes 6 weeks to do. during the 6 weeks we plan to swim the horse.

as far as the cheap price goes for the hca, my trainer has his lifelong friend a vet do the job. he pays the vet, and i repay him.

i am not using any other drug on this horse except for lassix. no winstrohl, amocar, banomine, or bute. his ankle does blowup somewhat after a race and the trainer has to work on him.

i have never done an I-wrap before, and have never heard of one before this vet suggested it. it involves a procedure where you draw the blood from a horse, send it to a lab, and then you go back and inject the ankle for 6 weeks with his own blood. the other way to go would be to blister him and give him time off. if he wins his next race i might try the I-wrap. so far no one has said anything bad about it.

[ralph_the_cat]

Originally Posted by lamboguy

i have never done an I-wrap before, and have never heard of one before this vet suggested it. it involves a procedure where you draw the blood from a horse, send it to a lab, and then you go back and inject the ankle for 6 weeks with his own blood. the other way to go would be to blister him and give him time off. if he wins his next race i might try the I-wrap. so far no one has said anything bad about it.

IRAP, its a Interleukin-1 receptor antagonist protein processing system that works pretty dam good... The first time I did IRAP was about 2 years ago... while the final testings were just finishing up on the procedure.... It was highly recommended from my vet and I took a chance with it since he was offering it at a discount... I had to inject this particular horses ankle every other start in one of his ankles before, he had a chip in his ankle that had been removed but the joint suffered from degen-joint-disease, and he would swell up if he didnt have a wrap on it or after a work/race... I had 10 starts in him and had the ankle injected with 95% HA maybe 4 times, which ended up costing nearly $400 or more just for a few months of racing, and I couldnt train him hard or even work him between races... I spent a grand on the IRAP in the end... they took his blood, did the entire freezing process and injected it in his joint the next day, the stuff is SUPER thick... I had it injected again 2 weeks later, after the 4th week they said go ahead and see how he starts to train... they saved one more injection in a freezer incase he needed it again, its been 2 years, I havent injected it with HA or an IRAP injection... it worked that well... but I did commit to giving him a simple Adequan ($55) injection in the main muscle every race or every other race depending on if he was to run on a synthetic surface or dirt.... he doesnt swell anymore, I can work him between races again, rather than just fast gallops... truely did the horse well, I highly recommened it... It rebuilds the joint through the protein processing system... he never swells up anymore... and hes even getting up there in age now, and doing better than he did as a 4 and 5 year old... I really havent had another horse like him that gave me problems, so hes the only one I have done it with... but when the time comes, I wont hesitate to do IRAP on another horse... do it! and start using adequan 12-18 hours out before the race... tight and cold ankles after every race, its been about 20 starts... magic

[lamboguy]

i have to thank you very much for explaining it to me. my trainer said he had done it to one of his other horses and he ran untill he was 11. that horse just retired the other day after a win!
i had asked other guys about the procedure and they just never heard of it including my partner in florida.

after hearing about it from you i am going to take a shot at it. normally i wouldn't have, but this horse has always baffled me. the horse won a 3 life for 30 in churhill and beat horses that went on to win stake races and 2x's. and he went backwards. my trainer now claims he can bring him back close to what he was a few years ago with the procedure. i still have all my alowance conditions to go for, so i am doing it.

[ralph_the_cat]

Originally Posted by lamboguy

i have to thank you very much for explaining it to me. my trainer said he had done it to one of his other horses and he ran untill he was 11. that horse just retired the other day after a win!
i had asked other guys about the procedure and they just never heard of it including my partner in florida.

after hearing about it from you i am going to take a shot at it. normally i wouldn't have, but this horse has always baffled me. the horse won a 3 life for 30 in churhill and beat horses that went on to win stake races and 2x's. and he went backwards. my trainer now claims he can bring him back close to what he was a few years ago with the procedure. i still have all my alowance conditions to go for, so i am doing it.

Its amazing how many people dont know about this kind of stuff... I guess you get trainers and owners just doing the same old routine, not taking the time to understand what's out there... it makes me wonder what else they arent taking the time to learn about... let me know how it goes, with your pony, it may be that its not so much hes not as good as he once was, its just that with the bad wheels its hard to TRAIN them like they use to... good luck...

[onefast99]

Originally Posted by ralph_the_cat

Its amazing how many people dont know about this kind of stuff... I guess you get trainers and owners just doing the same old routine, not taking the time to understand what's out there... it makes me wonder what else they arent taking the time to learn about... let me know how it goes, with your pony, it may be that its not so much hes not as good as he once was, its just that with the bad wheels its hard to TRAIN them like they use to... good luck...

The veterinarians have continuuing education courses available to them and many are just happy driving the needle truck from barn to barn. As owners we need to bring to the attention of other owners any new techniques that they have found were successful on their horses. Great post on this subject thanks!

[supercap]

You made the remark about tapping joints and how this is what we do as opposed to the Todd Pletcher who has a nanogram positive. Are you under the illusion that Pletcher does not tap joints? Why do you think he gets caught with painkillers in his horses? The only difference between Todd Pletcher and some 25 a day trainer is their stock. Go to the track and watch horses train in the morning every horse does the same thing. Gallop two miles, two minute lick, work a half. They all use the same vets , Oh I guess one guy gets a special alfalfa that nobody else does. Everyone knows what the other guy is doing ! Its all about the stock!! Give me 100 million in horses I bet I could win a few.

[supercap]

Let me get this straight , You pay 50k a year to keep a horse in NY?? I hope they put doughnuts out for you in the morning!