horsemen

Tuesday's Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority (HISA) virtual town hall was a free-wheeling affair, with the bulk of the two-hour meeting spent on a discursive question-and-answer segment moderated by trainer Ron Moquett and bloodstock agent David Ingordo, two members of HISA's horsemen's advisory board. The initial focus of the town hall was HISA's 2026 budget. This year's gross budget, recently approved by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), comes to $77.2 million. If all the available credits are utilized by the industry, the net budget comes out to $60.6 million (though...

Live racing has been canceled at Laurel Park for this coming Saturday, Mar. 14 due to insufficient entries, the track announced Monday morning. With the impending meeting at Colonial Downs set to kick off Thursday, Mar. 12, and two Points races for the Kentucky Derby and Kentucky Oaks scheduled for Saturday, Mar. 14 at that venue, Laurel Park will move all originally scheduled races for Saturday to Sunday, Mar. 15 as overnight extras. There will be live racing Friday, Mar. 13 with an eight-race program with first post at 12:00pm...

Wyoming and Kansas thoroughbred horsemen have officially joined the National HBPA, the organization announced Saturday. The Wyoming HBPA and Kansas HBPA were unanimously approved for full membership at Saturday's board meeting of the National Horsemen's Benevolent & Protective Association, which concluded the annual conference at Oaklawn Park. The Wyoming HBPA, which represents horsemen at Wyoming Downs in Evanston, is a new member while Kansas returned to the HBPA following a 17-year hiatus after live racing ceased in 2008 with the closure of The Woodlands. Made possible by legislation permitting historical...

On May 22, the HISA Board of Directors will take a vote that could result in the ban of Lasix in all races. Any decision made by the Board, whether to keep the rules as they are, or to enact a full ban, must be unanimous. In response, five trainers and Eric Hamelback, the CEO of the National Horsemen's Benevolent and Protective Association, signed a letter imploring HISA to continue to allow the use of the medication in most races. Trainer Ron Moquett was among those signing the letter. To...

Artificial intelligence on the track and the emerging threats of prediction markets and wagering are among the topics to be discussed at the National HBPA Conference to be held March 3-7 in Hot Springs, Arkansas, at Oaklawn Racing Casino Resort, the horsemen's organization said in a Wednesday press release. "Each year, we strive to take a deep dive into the serious issues facing racing while also showcasing innovation that already is making a difference," said Eric Hamelback, CEO of the National Horsemen's Benevolent & Protective Association (NHBPA). "Our goal is...

The horse racing industry will gain access to advanced machine vision technology through a new partnership between Equius AI and global surveillance provider IREX AI, the former said via a Thursday press release. The collaboration will deliver video intelligence platforms designed for racetracks, training facilities, and equine operations, utilizing IREX's existing security infrastructure currently deployed across 30+ countries at airports, government facilities, transportation networks, and major sporting venues. The technology suite includes real-time security analytics, fire and smoke detection, crowd monitoring, and biometric access control. Racing-specific applications will encompass individual...

After lengthy negotiations, the Jockeys' Guild of America and the Thoroughbred Racing Association of Oklahoma have agreed to the terms in the form of a 3-year agreement, which includes a minimum losing mount fee of $100, a fourth-place incentive and all riders will pay the per mount HISA fee, the guild said in a Thursday press release. Set to expire on Dec. 31, 2028, the parties plan to immediately seek approval from the Oklahoma Horse Racing Commission. The release went on to say that "extensive conversations with the Remington Park...

The folks who fought to preserve racing at the Northern California's remote half-miler in Ferndale deserve tremendous respect and credit for soldiering on to the bitter end. Make no mistake, the cessation of racing at the Humboldt County Fairgrounds in the coastal region of NorCal definitely rates as "bitter." There is no sugarcoating this one like a sticky tuft of cotton candy from the midway of Humboldt County's charmingly rural fairgrounds, whose ties to the sport date to 1896. Advocates for racing at Ferndale (pop. 1,398), a Victorian village with...

Just as two of our greatest race days unfolded at Churchill Downs, our sport received great news as the Florida Senate held firm and did not take up the decoupling bill that had passed the House a few days earlier. For the first time I can remember, the effort to defeat decoupling brought so many people in the industry together. I personally wanted to congratulate the Thoroughbred Racing Initiative and their team, organized by members including David O'Farrell, Damon Thayer, Barry Eisaman, Mark Casse, Tom Ventura and many others. They...

The Puerto Rico Horse Owners Association, Inc. (PRHOA) has agreed to drop a year-old federal lawsuit over allegedly unsafe surface conditions at Camarero Race Track after the owners of the island's only racing venue finally agreed to a long-sought demand by the plaintiffs to allow John Passero, the noted track-safety consultant who once served as the track superintendent at Laurel Park and Pimlico Race Course, to inspect the track. After a Feb. 10-12 inspection by Passero deemed that Camarero's dirt surface "was generally in good condition [and] not suffering at...

With the recent winter weather-related cancellations, Parx Racing, in collaboration with the Pennsylvania Thoroughbred Horsemen's Association (PTHA), will offer live racing on Thursday, Jan. 30 in an effort to reschedule days which have been lost due to adverse conditions, the groups announced jointly Friday afternoon. The long-term goal is to add race days in the coming weeks to assist horsemen who have been impacted by the card cancellations. Days will be added in the future using 10-day weather outlooks to determine the best dates, but in the interim, Parx will...

The Horseracing Integrity & Safety Authority (HISA)'s 150-Day Layoff Report rule is scheduled to go into effect Thursday, Dec. 5, the group announced Saturday afternoon. Announced back in July but beginning on the aforementioned date, any horse who has not raced in 150 days (approx. five months) or more must have a report submitted prior to race entry. It is recommended that said report be uploaded 10-14 days prior. Trainers will be notified when a horse has been off for 140 days. A live demonstration and Q&A will be hosted...