NYT: At the Derby, Racing Is Facing Its Drug Problem -- Takes the first step: admitting the problem

New York Times ^ | May 2, 2005 | JOE DRAPE

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LOUISVILLE, Ky., May 1 - Beneath its twin spires, Churchill Downs has completed a sparkling $121 million makeover in time for the 131st running of the Kentucky Derby, America's most famous horse race. But this year's Derby, which will be Saturday, may be best remembered for the plainclothes investigators roaming the dusty barn areas and for testing the horses for illegal performance-enhancing drugs before and after the Run for the Roses.

After decades of rumors about "juiced" thoroughbreds and ineffective attempts at regulation, the horse racing industry has acknowledged that it has a drug problem.

"It's a very serious problem, and the public perception is that it is a huge problem," said C. Steven Duncker, chairman of the Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association's Graded Stakes Committee, which mandated the increased postrace testing for the Derby and the rest of the most important races in the United States.

"I don't know if you can put a dimension on how widespread it is because, like in every other sport, our testing seems to be a step behind the cheaters."

For as long as horses have been racing, some trainers have sought an advantage. Sometimes, it has been as primitive as using a battery-type device to shock a horse during a race; recently it is believed to have become as exotic as using injections of the venom of the cone snail, which is found in the ocean and is prized for its joint-numbing qualities.

The ability of racing authorities to police the industry has been hampered by its patchwork of regulatory agencies. The industry has no national standards, the way professional sports leagues like Major League Baseball or the National Football League do. States set their own policies and Kentucky, home of the thoroughbred breeding industry and the most famous two minutes in sports, is among the most permissive when it comes to drug policy.

"We've been in denial the last 20 years," said John T. Ward Jr., the trainer of the 2001 Derby winner, Monarchos. "Over the years, you've heard a lot of rumors, but there has been no clear-cut evidence. But now we have to think of the future. When you look at the problems in the Olympics and the new-age chemicals out there, it is about time we secure all of our racing - especially our premier events."

Whether or not the horses in past Kentucky Derbys have been competing cleanly is hard to know, many trainers and industry officials say. Only one horse in the history of the Derby has been disqualified for a drug offense: Dancer's Image, who won in 1968.

The increased surveillance and testing at Churchill Downs this year come after positive test results in horses in California - including one trained by Jeff Mullins, who will saddle Buzzards Bay for the Derby - and the federal indictment of a New York trainer on charges of doping one of his horses and telling gamblers associated with the Gambino crime family about it.

In baseball or Olympic sports, the use of performance-enhancing drugs has little direct economic impact on its fans. But in horse racing, the bettors, who wagered $15 billion in the United States last year and $99.4 million on the Derby, have a financial stake in the outcome of a race.

Beginning Thursday, Louisville police officers and Jefferson County sheriff's deputies will take up posts on Churchill Downs' backside along with extra private-security guards hired by the track. And an independent team of investigators from the Thoroughbred Racing Protective Bureau and the Kentucky Horse Racing Authority will also be watching the barns of Derby horses.

"Frustrations are higher than ever among the honest guys," said Jim Gallagher, the executive director of the authority. "Now it's more important than ever we make people know that we are doing everything in our power to protect the integrity of the game."

In 2002, the Racing Medication and Testing Consortium was created in Lexington to come up with a uniform drug policy for the 38 jurisdictions in the United States, and to update testing for a wide range of therapeutic medications, as well as for drugs that are simply performance-enhancing.

So far, 13 of the jurisdictions have agreed to uniform guidelines, and another 13 are expected to sign on by the end of the year. Kentucky is among those that has agreed to the guidelines, although the stricter rules will not be enacted in time for this year's Kentucky Derby.

Among Dr. Scot Waterman's duties as the executive director of the consortium is to sort out "what's real and what's rumor," he said, about the use of performance-enhancing drugs. He has been busy.

With the help of investigators from the Thoroughbred Racing Protective Bureau, the consortium looks into accusations against trainers and veterinarians. Waterman acknowledged that some of those accused have fielded horses in prestigious races, including the Derby.

The consortium also spent more than $300,000 last year and has earmarked $650,000 for this year to come up with tests for chemicals like cone-snail and cobra venom.

"It's a fairly small percentage of people pushing the envelope," Waterman said. "Most vets and most trainers are playing by the rules. But we're shooting to get rid of it all."

For the first time at the Derby, for example, the top finishers will undergo what is being called a super test, which will screen for hundreds of drugs and metabolites.

In another first, each of the Derby starters will have a prerace blood test to detect alkalizing agents, which is evidence of what is known as a milkshake, a concoction of baking soda, sugar and electrolytes that helps a horse ward off fatigue. Twenty horses are expected to start the Derby on Saturday.

It is the method that the New York trainer Gregory Martin is charged with using to fix a race at Aqueduct, according to a federal indictment of 17 people accused of being involved in an illegal gambling ring. It also is what California racing officials suspected Mullins of doing, when a horse he trained tested for an illegal level of sodium bicarbonate in February.

Mullins denied the milkshaking charge and said that the elevated reading could have come from feed, supplements or stomach medications.

Still, for 30 days, Mullins's horses were housed in a detention barn and were under 24-hour surveillance. And for another 15 days, Mullins's barn was monitored. In the 60 days before the penalty, Mullins's horses won 28 percent of their races. That dropped to 13 percent while he was under surveillance. He lost additional good will within racing when he was quoted as saying that horseplayers were idiots and addicts, remarks for which he eventually apologized.

Duncker, who is also co-chairman of the New York Racing Association, says uniform regulations, increased testing and greater surveillance are progressive steps. The New York association will take an extraordinary measure when Belmont Park opens Wednesday. All horses will be isolated in a detention barn six hours before their races, with only the state veterinarian having access to them.

"We need a paradigm shift in what our punishment is; it needs to be tougher," Duncker said. "Right now in many places, a trainer can get suspended for seven days, pay a small fine and have his assistant run his horses while he's out. That's meaningless. What the tracks can do, however, is take away their stalls and not allow their horses to run at their tracks."

Ward, the trainer who has seen one of his horses draped with the blanket of roses, says that trainers, owners and track owners should embrace the new vigilance.

"Finally, we have awakened," he said. "This is just the start of it, and hopefully we're only going to get more sophisticated. These are difficult times in all sports to maintain a level playing field, but I think we can do right for these athletes and do right for all of us."

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Hillary, the show horse, not the work horse, warms up
for her race. It will take a village miracle for her to win.