Monday, November 16, 2009

In Our Bubble

(CHICAGO, IL – November 16, 2009) The fact that our free market system enables a small percentage of even the least likely achievers to make millions prompts us to believe that we have it better than any other place on the planet. Living in a country as mighty and prosperous and geographically isolated as ours, we Americans have little reason to wonder much about what’s going on elsewhere. Our myopia, in fact, seems patriotic.

Nevertheless, the embrace of exceptionalism is a dangerous slope. With the advance of technology shrinking the Earth with each passing day, there is little to suggest that the future holds bright for a country that isn’t fully aware that it’s part of a greater whole. In just about every aspect of life, with the possible exception of pop culture and missile warfare, the USA is now looking up to other countries. The data is daunting.

Americans live shorter lives than dozens of other populations. Our health care system is over-priced and under-performing. Educational standards, especially at lower grade levels, are embarrassingly inadequate. A generation ago, the label “Made in China” meant avoid at all possible. It now represents the source of half that is manufactured. All told, the country’s slide into a parallel existence with the part of the world that we once thought inferior has come quickly.

As a matter of fact, the first time I realized that the world was not exactly the way my father said it was came about as a result of the Canadian vs. Soviet hockey series played in 1972. Everyone I knew anticipated this first meeting between NHL professionals and Russian amateurs to be lopsided. Well, the Canadian team squeaked by the Russian team four wins to three and a tie, forever changing the idea that the game belonged solely to players on these shores. Since then, the number of foreign stars in hockey as well as in golf, tennis and, of course, soccer is overwhelming and, in basketball and baseball, a major influence.

Only a week ago in Southern California, European-based thoroughbreds proved superior to North American-raced horses in six Breeders’ Cup races. The half-dozen victories were two more than the imports should have won on the basis of the percentage of entries they represented. Of the six European-based winners, four have been nominated for Cartier Racing Awards – the end-of-year honors for horses running abroad. Only eight of the 37 European-based Breeders’ Cup runners that participated at Santa Anita were among the 34 Cartier nominees, meaning that European trainers didn’t even send their best runners to compete against ours and still they won.

Those who won’t accept these facts as logical would argue that the track surface favored the visitors. They may be correct in believing that a bias existed, but why then didn’t the same bias hold when it came to turf-raced Americans that were entered in Pro-Ride races? As further proof of how lowly the horse racing world views our champions, consider that unbeaten Zenyatta is listed fourth, tied with Rip Van Winkle, a horse that she trounced, on the World Thoroughbred Rankings compiled by the International Thoroughbred Racing Authorities. Moreover, only three American-raced horses were included in the list’s top ten spots.

Over the course of the next month, three world-class horse races will be run in all places - Asia. The Japan Cup on turf and the Japan Cup Dirt will offer huge purses, draw big crowds and be seen on television by 20 times the number of people who viewed the Breeders’ Cup. In mid-December, the Hong Kong Jockey Club, celebrating its 125th year, will stage four Group 1 stakes including the Cathay Pacific Hong Kong Cup valued at $2.5 million. We should start paying attention to these races and begin winning them, or else lapse into irrelevancy. Three issues stand in the way.

The first is that almost every foreign racing jurisdiction won’t permit the use of race-day medications. The second is that our horsemen believe that our horses, unlike the Europeans, suffer setbacks from traveling long distances and residing in quarantine for a limited time. The third is that there are so many rich purses for small fields with weak horses available here in the USA that only a great chance of winning in Asia or Europe would make traveling long distances sensible, and great chances, given the quality of our best, aren’t abundant.

Regardless, American horse racing isn’t facing the future prudently if it continues to live in its own bubble. The sport will fulfill a world vision as certainly as the NFL will launch teams in Mexico City, Toronto and London. Hat’s off to pioneers such as Wesley Ward for trying to win at Royal Ascot. Kudos to profit-seeking men with fast horses for heading to the Middle East when The Sheikh stakes $10 million to celebrate the inaugural Dubai World Cup at Meydan. The race will be contested over a new Tapeta track.

Given these circumstances, it seems irresponsible for the people who truly care about the sport overall to insist on dirt tracks exclusively. Such an investment would be counter-trend to the market and short-sighted as more and more money is generated from horse racing abroad. For the record, more than 50 percent of Grade 1 races on this continent are run on synthetic surfaces – seemingly perfect for horses with turf racing proclivity. If there’s one thing the Breeders’ Cup taught us, it’s that we may be playing catch-up already.

As for racing on a worldwide basis, the international expansion of the breeding industry into Ireland, Japan and Dubai will ultimately have its effect on where American-based horses will compete. There’s a trickle of back and forth already. Technology can deliver the gambling product everywhere. Eventually, some astute horseman will emerge to change the status quo.

Thirty years ago, D. Wayne Lukas became the first trainer to understand that restricting his horses to local offerings was limiting his earnings. Lukas began flying his thoroughbreds in to snatch purses at other venues about six years after Canada met Russia on ice. At the time, his un-exceptional practice seemed exceptional. But, like the Soviet’s success, it wasn’t.

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