Gregory Ferraro

In the wake of news that seven racehorses at properties under the jurisdiction of the California Horse Racing Board (CHRB) died in March, several commissioners and staffers at Thursday's monthly board meeting raised the verbal equivalent of a yellow flag with the goal of preventing future fatalities that would equate to a spike into red-alert territory. "Our injury rate, death rate, is creeping up," chairman Gregory Ferraro, DVM, said after CHRB equine medical director Jeff Blea gave the statistics in his report. "Do you have any solutions, reasons, comments about...

The California Horse Racing Board (CHRB) voted 6-0 on Thursday to approve a dates package for the back half of 2024 that will establish the current fairs-meet-only track at Pleasanton as the new crux of a Northern California circuit. The entire state has been trying to come to grips with the looming June 9 closure of Golden Gate Fields, the lone commercial track in the region, and the Mar. 21 vote by the CHRB was viewed as a NorCal racing lifeline by the estimated 250 supporters in attendance. Those very...

The precarious, up-in-the-air future of California racing and whether or not the state can continue to support two geographic year-round circuits was made no clearer after Thursday's California Horse Racing Board (CHRB) meeting. The 3 1/2-hour session was dominated by discussion of competing North-versus-South plans that both tried to carve a sustainable path forward while underscoring the dire circumstances that face the industry with the June 9 closure of Golden Gate Fields looming like an unavoidable asteroid. Although the CHRB concluded the meeting--which featured testimony that was at times emotional,...

Three members of the California Horse Racing Board (CHRB), plus the agency's executive director, on Thursday advocated for the reinstatement of temporarily suspended CHRB equine medical director Jeff Blea on the eve of his hearing before the California Veterinary Medical Board (VMB) to rule on a list of allegations that include administering "dangerous drugs" to racehorses without examination or medical necessity. "For my own two cents as chairman, I think that the issues surrounding Dr. Jeff Blea brought forth by the veterinary medical board are both ill-advised and slanderous," said...

As anti-whipping rules continue to evolve nationwide, one problem area that has emerged is the fairness of penalization. Do the various systems of fines and suspensions match the severity of the violations? Or, put more directly, are there ample deterrents on the books to keep a jockey from totally disregarding the number of times and manner in which a Thoroughbred is struck with the whip if the rewards of winning an important graded stakes like a Breeders' Cup race far outweigh the comparatively small dent a penalty might make in...

After initially being deadlocked on a Thursday vote to put off implementing anti-whipping regulations that have been repeatedly delayed since first proposed in March 2019, the California Horse Racing Board (CHRB) finally voted 4-2 to pass a rule that will prohibit a jockey from striking a mount more than six times during a race, and then only in an underhanded position with no more than two strikes in succession using whips that must meet new CHRB standards to soften the blows. Representatives from the Jockeys' Guild, plus California riders Mike...

At one point in Wednesday's California Horse Racing Board (CHRB) teleconference meeting, as discussion of yet another agenda item spiraled wildly off-topic and devolved into argumentive cross-talk, chairman Gregory Ferraro, DVM, attempted to restore order by firmly declaring "chaos is not allowed." For some industry participants who vocalized frustration Apr. 22 at how CHRB meetings have become increasingly dominated by anti-racing proponents using allegedly obstructionist tactics to muddle the hours-long monthly proceedings, the chairman's assertion must have seemed like the figurative equivalent of trying to cram toothpaste back into the...