Eight Belles

For the rest of us in America that do not fit inside Churchill Downs, and still want to connect with the race and it’s festivities, we go to our friends homes to drink bourbon, sometimes wear big hats and sit around the television and look at the parade of beautifully preserved southern matrons and statuesque prize horses. To make the sport more interesting to most of us who don't follow horse racing outside of this day, we place informal house bets or formal wagers on horses with names or odds that we like, and all of this is fun.

But the race itself is only 2 minutes long and it’s really over before you are able to identify your horse in the pack. And because the race is short, the Derby is really a front-loaded event, anticipation, speculation and admiration all leading up to the explosions of the gates opening and the blur of hooves. Sometimes what happens after the gates open is inspiring or even magical, such as the races with past winners like Smarty Jones, Barbero and before them Secretariat. But the Derby doesn't always present us a winner and a storyline we can fall in love with, and we as viewers are left suddenly uneasy with what to do or say with an unsatisfying or upsetting outcome. "What have we gotten into?", we may ask.

Yesterday we were presented a somewhat grotesque victory celebration of a horse that is difficult to embrace, while we were harshly reminded of a brutal fact of horse racing when Eight Belle was euthanized after her second place finish fall. These were the unscripted events that surely neither NBC nor The Kentucky Derby wished played out, after all, why should we face the heavy consequences of our sports or our wagers.

After the dust settles, the spectator gambler looks down at his or her betting receipts, as I did, and was reminded of my participation in the events on the track. Sorting through the remaining combinations that might accommodate the unexpected outcome, not finding any, I further disdained myself and what I saw on the field. Life was lost and so had I.

Postscript:

And if I had won, would I have not cashed my ticket in opposition to the sport/industry?

Answer: I would be thinking about brave Eight Belles quietly with a burn in my pocket.

Where proceeds could go:
Second Careers for Horses