2012 Grand National

[JoliJack]

How many horses had to be destroyed at the dubai festival this year

[DaveTehTipst0r]

three

[stainto]

Another quick point from me - a horse-owning colleague who was pretty vehement in her anti-National sentiments says that more horses break their legs at Badminton and other horse trials each year. Funny how you don't hear calls for that to be banned, something to do with the class of people involved perhaps?

[np2188]

"Tony McCoy himself as been on 20 horses since 2007 that have lost their life during a race"

I'll be all for banning McCoy from riding

[Scaifey]

Just a quick question from me - I have recently read a lot of people saying the field should be reduced....so for arguments sake, we now have a 25 field. Will that really stop deaths? What happens if one dies with the reduced field??

I personally think we are at the stage where we either stop it completely or leave it as it is...
_________________
Slow and steady wins the race!

[dragonman]

racing is a dangerous sport and yes it is correct horses get damaged doing elimentary dressage etc. I have 2 opinions on this year , Acoording to pete was a tragic racing accident hard to say ..... but one of those "racing incidents", however i do not believe Synchronised should have run at all , the stats showed that late on in the season he took vastly longer than the 29 days allowed to recover in previous seasons.

and after running a mile before the off you have to ask if it wasnt synchronised but an "also ran" tharawatt or the likes although he did very well , would they have A. gone without him or B scratched him.

its a lot of ifs and buts and racing is racing there is danger just as in any sport.

the argument is the horses dont have a choice , but horses are working creatures , pulling , pushing racing , riding etc. hardly anyone has a horse "as a pet" to just put in a field that serves no other purpose. if we didnt do things like this they would probably just become another source of protein in the food chain.

[dragonman]

it has also been widely reported since saturday that lowering the fences has made the national quicker and thus more dangerous , will reducing the field help ???? maybe until we get another foinavon pile up incidents will happen no matter how high jumps are or how many take part in the race.... for those that want lower fences and fewer horses ................ google RUFFIAN , 2 horses no jumps horrible racing incident.

[Systemsman]

I think the ONLY change that needs to be made for safety reason sis to get rid of any drops (cant undertsand why this was not done last year). Why do we need drops when the fences are so big and the race is over 4.5 miles with 40 runners?

Reducing the field size or distance size would be a disaster and destroy the unique nature of this race and distroy the 12month anti post market. It would help if there were a few more 3m6f to 4mile NH races available for practice including at Aintree.

Now the press issue is due to a lazy press and the need to sell papers/radio/TV time and avoiding doing any serious journalism (its an easy once a year story - no work but grreat headlines). The PR peolpe at Aintree and in the sport need to be better prepared for this and defend this great sport/industry that employees 1000's of people as well as do all they can for horse welfare (i..e. get rid of those dops - we dont need them - i cant see and have never seen what they add other than more danger)

[deswalker]

The argument for the drops is clearly that the difficulty of these fences is a big part of what helps to make the National course such an individual test for horse and for jockey. If you take out the drop fences you clearly do reduce the difficulty.

What the powers that be have to weigh up is if that additional difficulty is creating an unacceptable risk to the welfare of the horses (and jockeys for that matter). I think that they may well decide that it is.

Removing drops will make the National an "easier race"... still not easy mind... and will result in more finishers. It will probably make for a more interesting race with more contesting the finish and an even harder one for punters because the emphasis on sure footedness will not be quite so strong.

So it may probably be the best result for everyone? Apart from those looking for the winner of course!
_________________
"The problem with the future is that there are more things that could happen than will happen" - Plato (liberally paraphrased)

Follow me on Twitter: @Nick_Crossland

[alfiemarley]

ALL HORSE RACING WITH JUMPS SHOULD BE BANNED AS TOO MANY HORSES ARE GETTING KILLED, WHY CAN'T THEIR JUST BE FLAT RACING ALL THE YEAR ROUND AS YOU PUNTERS WILL STILL BE ABLE TO BET BUT ONLY A FEW UNLUCKY HORSES WILL BE KILLED. YOU WONT AGREE OF COURSE AS ALL YOU CARE ABOUT IS WINNING MONEY AND NOT THE WELFARE OF THE POOR HORSES.

[deswalker]

Great point alfie
_________________
"The problem with the future is that there are more things that could happen than will happen" - Plato (liberally paraphrased)

Follow me on Twitter: @Nick_Crossland

[Micko70]

I love the NH, as do many other people, there is also less of YOB culture at jumps meetings.

Flat racing is nowhere near as exciting as Jumps racing.

Look at the roar you hear when Cheltenham festival gets under way, you don't hear that roar at Royal Ascot or on Derby Day or Glorious Goodwood.

What happens to Cheltenham, Aintree and all the other jumps only tracks, close them down and have even more people unemployed.

There aren't enough quality flat horses to justify having flat only all year round, if that happened then i think we would see less people going racing every year.

We are not the only country to have jumps racing and not the only country to lose race horses during races.

Horses die on the gallops every day and also die during flat races.

If you want to stop the deaths then the only way id to ban all types of horse racing but the government will never let that happen as they will lose too much money.

Shall we ban football too now after that Italian player collapsed and died over the weekend as that sport is now becoming dangerous.

If you don't like watching horse racing when a horse sadly loses it's life then the simple answer is - Don't watch Horse Racing.

These arguments will go on and on for years but like i said the other day, nobody shouts for the sport to be banned after a death in a selling hurdle at Ludlow on a Tuesday.

Every single sport has it's dangers and the risk of death is there for rider aswell, not just the horse, we have lost jockeys lives during jumps races but racing still goes on.

The fact is that a human life is far more important than a horses, might sound bad but it's the truth and if we still continue racing after a jockeys death then horse deaths will never stop it for good, only allow a few rule changes.

Why not just ban anything to do with Horses until the breed becomes extinct, Actor Roy Kinnear bled to death from a broken pelvis after falling from a horse

Christopher Reeve was paralyzed from a fall during a 3 day event meeting, over 35 jockeys have lost their lives due to injuries received from riding a race horse including -
Joe Blanks, 24, died from head injuries on 15 July 1981 after a fall at Brighton Racecourse eight days earlier.
Sean Cleary, 22, Irish jockey, died from head injuries on 2 November 2003 after a fall at Galway Raceourse seven days earlier.
Richard Davis, British jockey, died from injuries sustained in a fall at Southwell Racecourse in 1996.
Tom Halliday, 20, British jockey, died from injuries sustained in a fall at Market Rasen Racecourse in July 2005.
Kieran Kelly, Irish jockey, died from injuries caused by a fall at Kilbeggan racecourse, 2003
Manny Mercer, died in 1959 after being kicked in the head after a fall at Ascot Racecourse.
Brian Taylor, British jockey, died from injuries sustained after tumbling from his horse
Steve Wood, 26, British jockey died from injuries sustained in a fall at Lingfield Park Racecourse, 6 May 1994