"I have come to a time in my life where I cannot watch a horse race. It evokes too much anxiety and fear, flashbacks of catastrophe, so I close my eyes and pray only for the horses to make it home safely.”
In a recent Guardian article, former exercise rider Elizabeth Banicki
explains why she has turned against horseracing. Some of the highlights:
“I have come to a time in my life where I cannot watch a horse race. It
evokes too much anxiety and fear, flashbacks of catastrophe, so I close my
eyes and pray only for the horses to make it home safely.”
“I galloped thousands of horses and so many were battling damaged and
otherwise malfunctioning legs that one of my strongest general recollections
is of working from on top of their backs to actively help them from
stumbling and falling. I galloped horses who moved so poorly it was as if
every step was a new agony. Their chronic pain coupled with the unnatural
way they are forced to live can lead to depression, frustration and
listlessness. Some horses get so angry they charge, teeth bared and intent
to hurt, anyone walking by their stall door.”
“Horses that are chronically injured but still in training, still running
races, are called ‘cripples’ in racetrack slang, and a trainer who engages
in the practice of treating their horses this way is called ‘a butcher.’
These are terms all racetrackers in America understand. The rigors of
training and running ensure that virtually no horse finishes a career
unscathed and most are done by five years old.”
“Eventually I made my way to Santa Anita in Los Angeles. At Santa Anita I
landed a job with a prominent outfit galloping some of the best-bred horses
in the world. Though I was working on the top string for a prestigious
trainer, I was not exercising the stars. Instead I rode mostly the ‘sore’
horses, the ones who needed nursing through their gallops. Some warmed up
and their stride softened and found a rhythmic safety. In those cases, I
settled in as passenger staying out their way as they trained themselves. I
was routinely reprimanded for not making my horses gallop fast enough,
because in my barn overall fitness took priority above the quality of the
legs. If the legs didn’t hold up there was a fresh set waiting to be shipped
in.”
“…when a horse is hurt, aggressively medicated, and forced to train and race
repeatedly at speeds that exceed their natural inclination, then it
constitutes abuse. The current standard in American racing – lots of
medication and extreme speeds on legs too young to endure it – is abusive
and the horses have no choice in the matter whatsoever. It isn’t simply an
issue of animal rights, it is one of ethics and morality.”
“I came to a time late in my career when I could no longer ignore inside of
me what I was seeing outside. The tapping of ankles on a three-year-old that
released a projectile stream of fluid followed by steroid injections. Horses
hobbling to, around and from the track. Young horses breaking their legs in
half. I justified doing my job by telling myself, and sometimes others, that
these horses would have to train whether I was there or not, and if I could
make it easier on them by being kind, letting them go slow and cutting the
distance short when I wasn’t being watched, then I was helping in some way
to combat the greater doom they faced.”