Understanding a Tough Derby Week with Equine Vet Greg Beroza

Alright. Hello everyone.

I am joined by dr. Greg Barossa dr.

B, or horse doc as he wants to be known.

Listen, we had a wild and crazy weekend at Churchill Downs last

weekend. And it was, it was definitely

tainted by the the horse deaths on the track and I for one

doctor. Broza dr.

B. Whatever you what do you want me

to call you first off? Just great, just call me Doc,

I'm just cutting Sakurai. Oh yeah, I can do that.

I for one doc think that, you know, sometimes horse-racing

shies away from From these things that are unfortunate part

of the sport. I think we all would love to get

to a point. We have zero horse fatality, but

we also understand that that's a goal that is not attainable.

And then we have all these horse fatality is, I think it's our

job to educate. So we brought on what I think is

the expert. Dr. Broza has worked on

countless big horses, charismatic, Swale even before

he was a vet, he was there working on Secretariat, so I'm

very excited to have doc on with us today and hopefully, we'll

all learn something so you weren't at Churchill Downs?

No, I wasn't. But I was glued to my TV and I

was also at Gulfstream this year where I saw the Florida Derby.

Pegasus takes a lot of the races leading up to it with all the

big horses in the big trainers, while trying to figure out if

they had enough points. Also, I was very fortunate

because I got an interview with the trainers from mage.

The delgado's and very wonderful people and I was very happy to

see they won but you're right. I've been at the track since

1971, walking hots for Johnny Campo, senior and work my way up

through the rungs of veterinary school and got to a much higher

level than my high school advisor, ever thought I'd get.

But it was, it was, it was an unusual year.

It was where since we're in the industry, we know these things

happen quite a bit, but on Derby Day to announce to the world

that these Of problems exist is is embarrassing.

All right. Well, let's start with the

scratch of forte first off the bat before we get to the desk.

So we're going to we're going to focus on those two things just

because they are veterinarian things.

The the vet, basically, we basically had, we had video on

Thursday, I think of for Tate's, taking a little bit of a stumble

and is morning workout. Then there the rumors started

flying as you can. Imagine the rumors started

flying love what was going to happen.

We first learned about it, maybe.

Thursday afternoon started hearing that there were some

Rumblings and then it looked like from the workout Friday

that the horse was good to go for pulley came out and said

he's going to run them and then the vet came and watch the horse

work out on Saturday morning and then the vet for the horse

racing commission decide to make the scratch.

I want to make sure we're very clear, the Kentucky Horse Racing

commission and Churchill Downs are not one in the same.

They're two different entities, the vet made that a cop Decision

to scratch the horse. One of the things I want to ask

you when they're going through that process.

I noticed that they were really judging more of how he worked

out on the pavement versus how he worked out, how he walked up

and down the pavement, versus how he walked on the tracker.

How he looked on the track is that common practice?

Well we try and look at him and every angle I mean some lameness

has our infirmities or problems occur more on a hard surface,

others occur more in a soft surface.

So more of your 10 In injuries, suspensory injuries, things like

that. Will show up a little bit more

in a soft surface such as the track and some of the ones that

are more Orthopedic like fracture or a deep bruise, will

show up more on a hard surface. So a complete exam which I'm

glad was done. Show, you have to examine the

horse in many elements because what you see on the track

sometimes is different than what you might see jogging up and

down the pavement and what kind of leads into the decision for a

vet to scratch a horse, you know, Looked like they took Todd

Pletcher Xandra Pollies. At least they were willing to

talk to them about it. I think that speaks volumes

again for those guys is what who they are as Horsemen personally.

But what kind of goes into that decision Well, the decision by

who by the Vets by Pletcher Myra Poli.

It's one huge bag just for the public sake.

Horse racing is a very difficult sport but it's no more difficult

than human sport to where every athlete comes out.

I mean, we looked at Mahon or Mahone play this year, we know

we had infirmaries, we've seen, Brady play with infirmity.

So the question is, is it something they can handle it out

on the field? Especially for a Super Bowl.

You don't want to sideline them, they have no more time to wait

to rest, to do all that stuff. So the question is, how do you

get them back and you get them back maybe by putting their arm,

their leg, or their foot in a bucket of ice for a while or

sometimes you resort to other modalities.

The question is, is it fair and Equitable and racing is illegal?

I can tell you this, from 45 years on the track that that

everyone is concerned about the horse neighing sound, so they're

all playing whatever Advantage they can play.

I mean, think about even the way the jockeys is advantage or

disadvantage just in Sing in general.

But they're all play every Advantage.

They can they want to win that race and sometimes it comes down

to fractions of seconds. So I can only tell you from my

my experience for probably and Pletcher.

Very aboveboard. People they want to do what's

right for the industry. Can you imagine the pressure on

them though that Forte was the eclipse Award winner.

From the previous year, he was horse of the year for that.

He won the two-year-old, not horse of eclipse award, but 12

year old Breeders Cup Championship for that.

Potentially potentially what I saw coming into that race if he

held up in the derby, like he didn't every other race and he

won. And that's an if he could be in

line to be the next Triple Crown winner, which he'd be going down

in the annals of sports. Not only for the prestige, but

for the breeding value down the line.

So it's hard for any of us to imagine the millions of dollars

of pressure on someone's head to say.

No, we have a problem here, let's address it.

I give credit to Doug O'Neill who Voluntarily scratched his

horse. I'll have another I was there

for that too. And you know he believed the

horse was a little bit sore and Dougie come under scrutiny and

the media is continued under scrutiny and I think more and

more of the real Horseman. And I mean and I consider

Pletcher O'Neill, people like that or Horsemen there in the

game and they dedicate for their whole life because they loved

the horses I do to. That's why I ended up in this

crazy business. But having said that that

typical Flinch test where you saw the veterinarian squeeze on

the bulbs of the heel. Cause of work Forte, I could get

that on almost for nearly any animal but I can't judge just

like you can't judge how much pressure you actually put.

There was it with, just a light touch or was it with a heavy

touch and the media is under tremendous scrutiny to.

You've got NBC Sports coverage, the whole world is watching this

most important race with the biggest whore.

So less than they need is an accident or breakdown.

Now, you also have to put in perspective that whole week

they'd had breakdown after break down that have problem after

problem. All they needed was one more of

these with the next potential Secretariat.

So they're all on edge and there's now a third element in

racing. We now have the hiss aboard we

have the horse racing Integrity, Safety Authority and those

people are looking down. They come into full Focus, I

believe in July but there's a host of rules that go with it

and all the tracks that have joined to be part of that

Network to give some common ruling to all the sports

activities and racing and all the medication.

Shoes and soundness issues, they each of those tracks cooperate.

So, from my understanding once and I don't know that Pletcher

and repelling to this at the time, I'd have to think Todd's

really sharp. He knew that, but I used to do.

I also do a lot of Standardbred work and what happens is when

you scratch a horse, when the vet scratches a horse in that

Arena, the owner has to come back and qualify with the horse

again and the Thoroughbred world is different.

They decided that 15 days, of course, couldn't run, which

meant an automatic scratch from the derby.

In automatic, scratched in the Preakness.

I didn't know that until I read the details of the history

rules. So there's no way tied in theory

could race unless there's extenuating circumstances.

So we're going to make an extenuating just for Todd

Pletcher. He's probably the best trainer

out there today or how they're going to act and then you were

the one that alerted me that. Now they've drawn blood and done

medication and and we'll see where all that pans out.

Whether they'll be another issue or not another issue.

I'm not forecasting. There is I'm not forecasting,

there isn't I don't like anyone being judged without having all

the facts, right? Speaking of judging, with all

the facts in the horse fatality, let's go onto.

We had 77 horse deaths that week at Churchill Downs and if we

even want to go back and include the the horse I was on the Derby

trail that that had to be brought down after training, was

it fire? How much?

There was a horse that was taken off the track but the winner of

the Sunland Derby you grafting. Okay, so you're right there were

seven out of eight horses that were involved in soundness

issues that That were affected that weekend.

So going back to that, just that whole week, which is, you know,

I've been on Churchill Downs, backside a whole lot.

It was a very unusual thing for us to experience at Churchill

Downs. We had two of those death so

that happened not because of racing injuries.

They had happened more, I don't know.

There's some I don't know if it's a heart attack or whatever

it was not from an injury that happened in the same day with

the same. Shane trainer and both Churchill

Downs and the horse racing commission, made a decision to

suspend the common denominator, and safie Joseph.

Knowing that they would not have any kind of answers really, at

least a minimum of 10 days from the incident.

So when we go through that is it isn't even plausible for us to

get answers of what happened from the from those horses that

passed away. Well, the bottom line answer is

it's improbable we will get an answer but is it possible?

Yes. I was there for the post-mortem

of soil actually. I had a pretty interesting role

in determining that there was some issue with the heart based

upon some Scar Tissue. I saw on the heart that call was

finally made by Helen a clean and new bolt and Center lead

pathologist in the country but there was nothing else that

showed up on that horse and he had won the Belmont few days

before. He was just going out for route.

Gallop. But having said that, it made me

think a lot about what's going on with these sudden deaths and

we see them even in human Athletics, all of a sudden we

saw that one with the Bangles bills this past year.

It wasn't something. I luckily, luckily, the athlete

did well in the long run, but they had immediate medical care

or horses, a different subject, different animal.

So we never know. But these passing out Out on the

track or whatever it's called they can be instigated just by

an electrolyte imbalance, too much potassium.

Something like this, so it could be in the hydration dehydration.

Flu is not fluids, and it could be medications.

Let's not kid ourselves that is in the formula, but to determine

it is tough. And most people are pretty

shrewd about complying with that absolute number of Medicaid

within the medication law that they can get by.

That should just be acceptable on all.

Playing field. Should I say so whether we'll

get an answer or not. I think there's there's

pathologist and I think they would tell you that we get the

answer, maybe 40% of the time. I'm making up that number off

the top of my head because we don't examine all the ones that

maybe happened in the past, so we really don't know.

But could it be medication? Yes.

Am I here to say it was no, do I suspect it?

I hope not. Let's just put it that way.

Could it be an electrolyte imbalance?

It could be, it could be any number of things.

And the other part that We can get into this a little bit more,

which also ties into the breakdown issue which are

Orthopedic injuries, which are more commonly.

Seen not just the horse exercising and dying but there's

the bleeding rules and regulations and the medication

for it and all sorts of things are crop in here at which the

trainers are really trying to do the best they can.

I think the potential fatalities in the thoroughbred racing

industry, you might have a number of better than me but

it's something like less than 1% now.

It used to be higher but everyone's paying attention but

the Opportunity to find a problem is incredibly Manute.

And so I'll introduce here that I have a good friend who

mentioned this several times. There's ways of doing blood

tests in advance of the races, and things called the health

passport, which we could do the problem with that is a

tremendous expense to do that. Every horse would ever races,

maybe we could start with some of these graded stakes races

that are under the most scrutiny.

Also, if you want me to keep going, the other, the other two

factors is the these horses. Currently our following under

the greatest competition I've ever had, because to get into

the Derby, you know, have to have a number of points, so

these races are more competitive than ever.

The best for going against the best of the best just to measure

up to that. I think it's an extremely

important way to say, we're getting only the best of the

best someone distant getting because they want one big race

and had a pot before that it went by purses.

So of course, could win a big race and then be off.

Four weeks, six weeks, go to a lighter race, just to stay in

shape and race against so many horses racing over and over and

over again. So that could be a factor

because the stress of racing think about it like a boxer or

UFC guy. I mean, you can't do it every

week. You need some down time to heal

and recuperate, even if you don't get beat up too badly, so

that's another factor. And then the other four third

factor that I think is extremely important, is the racetrack.

Now, I'm not here to blame Churchill Downs because I think

they're, That's about as safe as any track in the country, most

of the tracks today are safe. But what I will tell you is that

each one of the tracks has a slightly different racing

surface. Yep.

You're not identical. We I learned that I wrote an

article about the breakdowns. I called it.

The Perfect Storm, and Aqueduct. We having a run of breakdowns.

There was nothing wrong with the Aqueduct Racetrack.

What was wrong with? We had a mild winter in New

York. That was the key factor.

There was about five things, but we had a mild winter in New York

and on a certain date. Claire.

Well with the racing goes to the winter track, which is Aqueduct

which they did, but that track was built with a lot of sand

deep and a hard base believing there was going to be freezing

in the just before they hit face.

Well, there was no freezing and horse were going fatigue right

through the sand and smacking the base and there are coming up

and I have to give credit to a number of really sharp trainers

have been around a long time. That keep me into this being a

major problem because everyone is running around trying to

figure it out. Well, the same thing here, I'm

not trying to criticize anyone. Rach butt.

I know from the veterinary perspective that bone takes time

to remodel, you know, takes time to heal.

Well, they were models to, and that's why these two year olds.

They're not really fully mature yet and their bones.

Remodeling, same thing for soft tissue, that tendons of this,

you know, the suspensory zits, Etc.

Check ligaments if they're to get bigger and stronger just

like muscles it, okay? It's over time.

You can't stress them to the breaking point.

You build up? Anyone works out knows you build

up, but you don't break yourself down and then you give you time

off and then and then you build up.

The same thing here, but some of these horses shipped all over

the country just to build up points, they raced on different

tracks, different surfaces, this will not be a simple problem to

solve and they'll be all sorts of theories, but I will throw in

the mix that the various tracks. The amount of competition of

that day and all the previous races, a number of competitions,

the best going against the best before they meet in a Triple

Crown Series. That should be keyed into this.

So when you say the best of the best going against each other,

you think that adds more More stress to the Bone or stress, to

the to the orthopedic in, that could cause Orthopedic injuries

to the horse. Well, let's face it, they're

going faster and harder than ever before.

I mean, no one's broke Secretariat's record but, you

know, and I don't know if we will with the point system,

honestly, I don't know if we'll have someone set the pace that

we need early on in the race. Although the last couple

Derbies, there's been a quick Pace, the those first half a

quarters. But yeah, well, you know, I can

relate to the Standardbred industry to that.

In the early days the standard bread's all race on one mile.

That's it, it's time. And I remember when, you know,

Noah would break a two minute mile, and now it's down to one

40s and what they used to do, unbeknownst to the public is

they would put rollers out on the racetrack and press that

track down to get the fastest time to say that.

The 19, whatever hamiltonian. And this particular track was

right at the fastest time anyone's run.

And we had the horse here to prove it.

But they were too many injuries popping up.

And I think, now, everyone and, I mean, everyone is concerned

more about the safety than they are about the time, but as far

as the Secretariat record, most people forget the second fastest

horse, in the history of the Derby.

Yeah, because no one pays attention to who came in second,

sham, and that was sham, and Sham broke down.

Theoretically in the final race in the Belmont, he broke

something in the rear leg. I think it was a sesamoid in his

rear, fetlock, or Like that. But I know that, you know, I

know the I did some work for Pancho Martin and I know Carlos

Martin very well and they're all, they all assured me that he

broke down, that's why he got pulled up.

He didn't even he came in last, so no one wants to be less.

They want to be first second, third fourth, to get points and

nothing money for a reason. Right?

Yeah. So I'm listen, I'm not a genius.

I mean, I tell you my high school guidance.

Counselor told me to pick a different career, but I did.

Okay. And the reality is common sense

dictates that these horses are running harder and faster and

sometimes traveling to a different track in a different

state just to pick up another five or ten points so they can

be in the derby. So the last time so that brings

up an inch and I wouldn't actually plan on asking you

this. So so major wins without racing

as a two-year-old, right? Last time we saw that was

justified just if I got through the three Triple Crown Races won

all three but then that was it. I mean got severed.

His aunt injury. Still with us, you know the

horsemen did what they got to do to keep him around, they retired

him. Does that make it almost like if

your Mage and you run all three of these Triple Crown Races if

you win the Preakness. I mean, what's the likelihood?

We even see that horse, get to the Travers or to the Breeders

Cup. I mean it's it's a lot, right?

It's certainly as you know, I was fortunate, I interviewed the

delgado's and wonderful people and I was so happy for them and

congratulated them. Die.

Happy to see, they're entering the Preakness.

But if you notice the same things happening them, that

happened to for today, we're a little nervous.

They didn't want to race in the Florida Derby at the time I

interviewed him. They weren't sure some of the

people said we should. We shouldn't we at cetera, you

know, everyone want to go. Didn't want to go against the

Giant Killer there. You know, Alan Jerkins those

days. He felt the horse was a little

bit vulnerable and he had a good horse.

He raced the horseback people forget onion.

He was only, I think it was onion.

It was proved how one of those two things was proved out.

Maybe he resource back only after after six days.

Is running. He just said I got this young

horse in the barn that just he came back and he sup he looks

great. Let's get them back out there

and he beat Secretariat but I'm glad that.

I'm glad that the delgado's erased Mage in the derby.

They were considering shipping cross-country might have been a

different Derby this year if they had done that things

happen, when you ship. Yep.

And and also things happen tying that into Some people that I was

one of them used to believe you go to the track early for a few

weeks and you train your horse on that track to get used to the

track but maybe if it's a different track conditions,

maybe your slowly creating some damage there.

Thinking the horse got familiar with the track but he's doing

new things to remodel his bone years ago I remember

representing a relative at horse training at the Moran.

Place in Pennsylvania on five bar and I brought a trainer out

with a rich tyminski looked at the horse.

And I said, what do you think? He said, he said doc, if We had

the horse in this afternoon at Belmont.

It would have won. Just about any race.

He said, get me the horse to the track and it took two weeks of

the horse qualified to get on the track and with those two

weeks, he bucked The Shins bone remodeling.

Yeah. Interesting.

What if, what about, what about the breeding do you feel that

that has led anything to brittle?

Bones is the breeding industry with the horses at all?

Then sexual side of it. I guess.

You know honestly, I don't know if I knew I would I would tell

you my instinct that it might have something to do with it.

There's a lot of people to blame all sorts of things on the

breeding. It may be.

The only thing I can tell you which to some degree is sort of

a problem in Thoroughbred. Again, it's been a prominent

Standardbred. They're trying to outbreed now,

to Europe and bring another Bloodlines, we're down to the

horses of bring the most dollars at a sale, or all the tappets,

and we'll all the other horses that are Have I remember when

Northern dancer it goes back? Many years.

I remember Northern dancer in his later years he couldn't

breed to. Well, he only bread a few mares

and they may not take her. They may take and there was

people that were paying one and a half million dollars for

breathing with no security. Meaning, if they don't take,

they don't take, we both will give it a good breeding and we

don't see that today, but, but your question is a good

question. I don't know that there's anyone

there. That could really answer it.

I think that You would hope to believe that.

If a horse is unsound, you don't want to breed them.

If he sound, you want to breed them, but I've seen horses and

you know them horses that have one that have done nothing

substantial to track. I mean a good Bloodlines and

they didn't do anything substantially broke down and

they turned around. They become Super Stallions.

Yeah. Yeah, so my wife calls me good

for you. That sounds like a good

marriage. So one last thing and again this

is probably getting real back to the basics but then when I want

to make sure we were respectful of everyone's time and we get

you going, explain to the Casual person.

Why if a horse has a lower limb injury, why they have to

normally be put down Well I can sum it up with basically two two

basic procedures. One first of all, unfortunately

is a horse worth the value to try and make Valiant efforts to

try to do this. I mean they tried with Barbaro

actually. One of my colleagues from new

boat and Center, Dean Richardson was a guy got assigned, the case

and and you work valiantly and did everything he could, they

have a swimming pool Recovery Center there, they've got

everything set up to do it the right way and they couldn't save

him. So that's, that's one example,

checkered. The great secretary was It down

for leg infirmities Lama, Titus later in his life that even the

best veterinarians. I knew one of about five

Superstars that were brought in everyone had a slightly

different opinion. I know, Lauren Evans from new

Bolton and he said, you know, he gave his two cents on it, but no

one could stop the laminitis, but there's no such thing as a

three-legged horse that could do anything.

Although, although I did, I did see a three-legged horse High

dilution, Lawrence born, one year that dr.

Keefer worked on that, say that. That horse for a period of time

until the colic and he put up prosthetic on it, but that's a

rare occurrence. So you have to have a horse

worth of value. It's not Humane to put them

through all the stuff that it would take to put them through.

Can they be saved? Well, an effort can be given but

what people don't realize is very little muscle in the lower

leg. It's all bone and tendon and

things like this, but the muscle brings blood supply and helps in

healing. So, some of the muscle portions

of the body like if they rip in the starting gate and you have

to show up a mushroom, It'll heal.

But when you start getting lower leg with the, with a circulation

could be cut off. That is a major problem.

So we'll never solve that 100%. There is improvements, but it

can be devastating. And I think for if a horse runs

and they keep running, I'm blanking the horse.

Now for Billy badgett years ago at Belmont, they kept running

and running and running and the same thing happened with

Ruffian. He kept running and running, and

he just pulverize the leg. So there was nothing left to

really to save. So, If the damage is too great,

The main thing is to put them down if they're of tremendous

value. And it's worth that kind of an

effort, you try to save them even if it's just for

humanitarian purposes. But the people going in that on

the horse and trainer would say, we know we're signing up for a

difficult battle here, but, can it be done?

There's a lot of things could be done and hopefully there's some

advances in the future to. So the best thing is prevention,

and that's what we're working on.

Hopefully today. And hopefully the message we're

going to get from all these drug issues and breakdowns through.

This hiss aboard through the Kentucky Horseman's through

Churchill through the cooperation, is what's the best

thing we can do? And I'm going to tell you that,

I think prevention is the key. We have that now was the first

guy in the east coast. Privately to put a nuclear

scintigraphy for horses. We could find stress fractures

before they were even obvious to a radiograph.

This is what we have to be concentrating on to prevent

these from even happening. I love it.

Let's get on the good side of the problem with let's prevent

and try to minimize that number. But We know will never be zero,

but the more we can get that close to zero the better.

So doc really appreciate you. How can people find more about

you and read all the good stuff that you put out there?

Well, I didn't go to then go to my website, don't know, it's not

that you have a horse doc.com as was up doc.com, that's how I'm

sorry. No, it's okay.

It's the www. Dot was wz U PD o si.com.

I thought I saw that earlier in there you might have changed it

or changed or Something now that's all right.

Yeah but anyway that's the website and you'll see that I

have a bunch of YouTube's are under talking horses.

That's it and I do talking horses and I have interviews

with safia have interviews with a delgado's.

I have interviews with a bunch of these people and even have

that for winning the Travers and I have a bunch of things like

that. People enjoy, they got any

questions, please send them to me and I'm glad to contribute

with you guys. If you ever need me for any

other opinions again, I'll try and do it as politically correct

as possible and get it done. Now we're going to we're going

to have a whole lot more collaboration with you so I'm

looking forward to it. So doc I'll talk to you later.

Thank you so much for me right back.