Racing: Long trip finishes in tragedy

Photo / Thinkstock

The conversation at Pukekohe on Saturday went something like, Dillon: "What the hell are you doing here?"

Melbourne racing journalist Neale Donnelley: "I've got a share in Xquisit in the 2-year-old race."

Dillon: "You'll probably win it from the inside gate."

Donnelley: "Hope so, she should have won her first start.

"It's a bloody long way to come to watch them run second."

It's a hell of a lot further to come to watch them snap a leg, requiring euthanasia.

The horrific sight of the talented Xquisit facing her last moments on Saturday is a timely reminder of a couple of points.

First - and we've said it previously - shake the hand of someone you might not necessarily have too much time for when they win a race, because it's extremely difficult to do.

The second is the answer to the often-asked question of why horses injured like Xquisit cannot be saved.

The simple answer is that in most cases it's an issue of the horse's weight. And the type of injury.

A horse's average 510kg is an impossible burden to place on an opposite good leg - rarely is there a good result.

The pain and suffering a horse is required to endure during cure cannot be justified.

Also the type of fracture to a leg is critical. If the cannon bone (from the knee down to the fetlock) has a vertical fracture it can be pinned and often a horse can return to racing. McGinty was a famous case.

A horizontal fracture across the cannon bone is much more serious.

Nothing is impossible and former fine mare Miss Potential was strung up from the ceiling of her box for months while she had serious leg injuries repaired.

She came back to beat Aussie's best in the A$500,000 group one Myer Classic.

There might be a tougher game in town than horse racing, but it's difficult to imagine what it could be.

If there is, participants will have big hearts.

Oh, and before the bleeding hearts say the game is cruel to animals, many more horses injure themselves as Xquisit did on Saturday lolling around their paddocks.

Maestro John Wheeler has close to the biggest team of jumpers in New Zealand.

At the end of last season he lost three of his best horses to crippling injury.

Not one was racing related.