Sportsfrog.com

This book report comes courtesy of longtime contributor and resident horse expert Bensell.

First off, let me admit that I’ve met Jim Squires on a couple of occasions and have always found him friendly. There is no way that I would even consider him an acquaintance, much less a friend, and I’m positive that he wouldn’t know me from Adam. I enjoyed his first book about thoroughbred racing, A Horse of a Different Color, which was about the 2001 Kentucky Derby winner Monarchos whom Squires bred at his Two Bucks Farm. I had heard rumblings about this book, and its attacks on the industry’s status quo for months, so I was looking forward to it immensely.

Squires focuses the book on the 2008 racing season, interspersing the story of downsizing his own farm after falling prey to both financial and medical issues. He portrays the thoroughbred industry as one dominated by a small ring of insiders who fleece the richest of the newcomers, while keeping the smaller farms in a bind by controlling access to the elite side of the breeding business. This is an oversimplification of the current situation, and a take that puts Squires in a good light as the story unfolds. But the truth is much closer to Squires version than the happy front that the horse racing elite would like the average fan, or more importantly a new owner, to believe.

The 2008 Kentucky Derby has been called by many in the industry as “The Last Steroid Derby.” Squires has a legitimate place on the soapbox as he wrote an editorial before the ‘08 Derby decrying the use of steroids in racing. Most casual fans remember the horror of the runner-up, the lone filly in the race named Eight Belles, snapping both front ankles shortly after crossing the finish line that necessitated her being put down on the track even before the winner Big Brown had been pulled up on the far turn. The filly’s trainer, Larry Jones, was vilified by many parts of the media and various animal rights group as a monster for what turned out to be a complete freak accident, as the filly had never been injured or treated with any sort of steroids (including ones that were legal in racing at the time). Jones has long trained horses owned by Squires, and the reader gets a good look at the trials and tribulations that Jones had to face in the months after the Derby which led to his decision to retire from the industry at the end of the 2009 racing season.

Squires talks candidly of the culture of medication that dominates the racing industry. One of the best examples of this is last year’s Derby winner, Big Brown. His trainer, Richard Dutrow, Jr., has served numerous suspensions for violation of the few medical rules that were in place before last year’s changes. But the real pushers in steroid race are the veterinarians, allowing the trainers to one up each other with newer and better (and impossible to detect) forms of medications. Squires tells the story of Dr. Alex Harthill, who treated at least 26 Kentucky Derby winners in the years between 1948 and 1989. And, as Squires writes, “a lot of losers were in his care during the week before the Derby as well, supporting a belief in some quarters that his presence at Churchill Downs could have been the most important factor in countless outcomes of the world’s greatest race in the modern era.” He recounts several well known Harthill stories, as well as a few I’ve never heard.

But Squires saves most of his venom for the group of insiders who dominate all aspects of the thoroughbred industry, a group of elite men he calls “The Dinnies,” after the Chairman of the Jockey Club Odgen “Dinny” Phipps. He does a very good job laying out how the Jockey Club, and a few of the other major organizations, rule the sport. For years this group has resisted any calls for reform of medication and had only started moving on some of the other safety issues, such as artificial racing surfaces and insurance for not only jockeys, but exercise riders and grooms as well. Squires details how this elite controls the most important part of thoroughbred racing – the breeding and auction sides of the industry. He tells about how he was approached before one of his yearlings was to be sold at auction with an offer to buy the horse privately before it would enter the sales ring and that Squires and the new owner would split the sales price. When he declined the offer, he quickly found the main consignors (sales agents) had decided to boycott his horses. This practice of not disclosing who the real owner of the horse makes it easy to underbid on your own horse secretly, and is one of the widespread unethical (if not illegal) practices that are prevalent in the industry today. The lack of transparency has been the way many a new owner has found himself with a $200,000 colt that had actually only cost the consignor about half of that amount.

This book explains much of what the thoroughbred industry has become over the past few decades. It is an industry dominated by a handful of insiders and run on heavy doses of legal, and much more often illegal, medications. The lines of “good and evil” aren’t as clear as Squires would like you to believe, but he does a good job of outlining how the industry has gotten itself to its present condition. Squires touches on all aspects of the thoroughbred industry, from breeding to the sales ring to the race track. This book is not for the casual racing fan, but for any serious fan of the game it is a must read.
(Note: This website received a promotional copy of this book)