Oh nooooo... that's awful Lockes   I can't understand why they let it happen.....

No I cant Baz I donate monthly to the RSPCA so I have phoned them today to see what they intend to do about it.. I live about 300 metres from the racecourse and it sickens me to see all the glammer of the races!! and these poor horses are being practically murdered

It seems so wrong Lockes.....  There must be something wrong with the course if so many of them die

Thats really awful
Iv heard of horses dying at the grand national before but only 1 or 2 not that that is any better but 7! thats tragic

Drop in and let us know if you get a reply Lockes

ok Baz will do

Can it be cruelty to animals when the horses enjoy what they do!Yes horses died but they were tragic accidents not acts of animal cruelty.

Was that 7 in the Grand National Race itself?
Its dreadful

Seven for the  3 or 4 day meeting, six races a day. No horses died during the national itself.Some of it was pretty graphic viewing with horses left twitching on the ground, I remember one died instantly, it was left motionless on the ground obviously dead before the jockey hit the deck.

Now that IS cruelty

During the meeting, not the Grand National...that means over the smaller fences  (not that the Grand National ones are that big these days anyway).

They run one race a day over the national fences croc.

Ah I knew they used some of them bu no sure how many...but  always thought the smaller fences were more dangerous anyway cos the bigger fences make the horses jump properly

"""But the RSPCA will not release the details because of an agreement with the Jockey Club, which ran the sport until last week. And a spokesman for the Jockey Club said the information would not be made public because Animal Aid "would use any specific figures as a potential tool for their cause, which is to see jump racing banned""" (2006)


You can safely say that it was  too warm, sunny, hard and fast for safe riding. Jump racing seems safer when it's dull wet slow and muddy.

It should have been banned years ago

I think we're on very dodgy ground there. (sic) If we were talking about banning things on the evidence of a few ill-founded generalisations. I would be the first in the queue seeking to ban people in cities/towns from keeping dogs and having children. They have no idea.

I found this link on DS a few days ago. It was posted my Missy Fantastic, so I wont claim to have found the information. It covers all courses. Very sad when you see the list.

Animal Aid's Race Horse Death Watch was launched during the 2007 Cheltenham Festival. Its purpose is to expose and record every on-course Thoroughbred fatality in Britain.

The horse racing authorities have resolutely failed to put horse death information into the public domain, preferring to dismiss equine fatalities as ‘accidental’ and ‘unexplained’. Even when several horses die at a single meeting, the term ‘statistical blip’ is often deployed.

http://www.horsedeathwatch.com/
Edited to add ^^^my link needs to be copy & pasted into your browswer

blimey Essie

Ah well! If we wern't racing them, we'd be eating them.

So have they found some Freedom of Information loophole then.  I'd have thought that as the races are public events, then this information should be available through an FOI request.

Though I am aware that you can make an FOI request... whether they say yes or not is another matter!

Our research indicates that around 420 horses are raced to death every year. About 38 per cent die on racecourses, while the others are destroyed as a result of training injuries, or are killed because they are no longer commercially viable.


Yett it has it's deathwatch total at 508 in 1112 days  which is roughly one horse every 2 days, which, considering there must be about about150 horses running each day. Isn't IMO, that big a deal.

My dad told me today that 4 horses died the day before the actual National Race Day... on Ladies Day!

omg...  that made me feel a bit sick!

but then I am an animal person - if that read "420 politicians are worked to death every year, about 38 per cent die in the house of commons, whilst others are destroyed as a result of canvassing & kissing babies or killed cos the public no longer believes in them" I'd have read it and then clicked onto the next thread without much thought!

who's research though, and is it world wide !! that site is very misleading, and I'm taking it all with a pinch of salt. However you are correct, or your dad is about the horses on ladies day.

yeah.... and I am a realist....  I don't expect racing to be stopped, I don't expect races to be made so safe that (from a punter perspective) it kills the sport.

My Dad's into the horses big time...   he views my feelings about it all as "girlie".

So, its the really unnecessary dangers that I focus on...  Beechers Brook was one of them... that jump used to be a total nightmare, but I understand that's been changed now.  And generally... I quietly have my own little protest by abstaining from the Grand National, whether it be a sweepstake.. or my father waving a share of his winnings in my face (yes, I have actually said no to the cash.. once)... 

That said...  I don't judge others for getting involved in it all, though I do think its good if the "other side to horse racing" as in Barneys original thread, is made available.

Much prefer the flat.

We cancel each other out!  I hate the flat.

Very sickening to hear, thats why I don't watch the horse racing..