Page 16 - Speedhorse April 2019

AQHA RACING UPDATE
“I welcome you to stay alert and join us whenever we need your support to lobby against the latest Horseracing Integrity Act introduced by United States Reps. Paul Tonko and Andy Barr on March 14, 2019.”
Janet VanBebber
April 2019 • AQHA Racing Update ANNUAL AQHA
CONVENTION
& Blog On Race Day Medication
by Janet VanBebber, AQHA Chief Racing Officer
We are back from Fort Worth, having just com- pleted the annual AQHA Convention. Your Racing Department staff is busy in Amarillo implementing the business decisions made while there. Our first step is to present the motions made to the Executive Committee when they meet at our International Headquarters in April. Racing issues that will be presented include the Graded Stakes schedule for 2020, a measure to adopt protocol to record earnings in a ‘no contest’ situation and endeavor to have this consistent between Equibase and AQHA, establishment of this year’s Champions Selection Committee, establishment of an International Racing Sub-Committee, the ongoing effort to confirm the 2020 Challenge Championships host site, and finally, adopting a revised fee for horses that need both a tattoo and a microchip to meet specific jurisdictional requirements. Stay tuned to learn of the Executive Committee’s actions regarding these measures.
Probably the most pertinent topic that has emerged since the Convention is regarding my concern for protecting our right to administer race-day medication to racing Quarter Horses. I covered this in a recent blog, but in case you haven’t seen it, I think it’s worth printing in this article. Here is what I have to say on the topic:
“A lot of columns in various periodicals have been devoted to the topic of safety and integrity in horse racing since the Stronach Group press release was issued March 14, 2019. In case you’re not familiar with the situation in Southern California, the owner
of Santa Anita Park, a prominent Thoroughbred racetrack, addressed its ongoing issue regarding the catastrophic loss of 22 horses, with an opportunity
to further a political agenda regarding their desire to ban all race-day medications. I am a lifetime horse- man who now fulfills the role of chief racing officer of the largest equine breed registry in the world, and I am concerned. Here’s why you should be, too.
Since joining the American Quarter Horse Association in this capacity three years ago, I
have never tried to assert my voice over what our Thoroughbred counterparts do. However, I stand firm in my resolve to protect what our Quarter Horse indus- try needs and to guard the welfare of our athletes.
In 2018, the Stronach Group came out in support of federal legislation that, among other things, seeks to ban race-day medication, including furosemide, or Lasix, as most people refer to it. We at AQHA have a long list of reasons to be concerned about federal overreach in our sport, especially in the realm of drug testing, in light of the intended prohibitions referenced above. We strongly main- tain that taking Lasix away from our sprinting ath- letes would, indeed, create an animal welfare issue.
The Stronach press release has successfully diverted the scrutiny surrounding the alarming rate of recent breakdowns to a completely separate issue. We are no longer talking about the deaths of horses; now we’re talking about something entirely
14 SPEEDHORSE, April 2019