Forte’s Race-Day Scratch, And The Multiple Equine Deaths At Churchill

The 2023 Kentucky Derby was run under what we can definitely term battlefield conditions, as the 16-1 longshot Mage, with Javier Castellano in the irons, performed a textbook imitation of the surprisingly scratched favorite Forte in going six wide and coming from behind in the last furlong to best his closest rivals, Two Phil’s, who placed, and Angel of Empire, who showed.

But it was Forte’s scratch early in the day, that opened up the race in the eyes of many for Mage’s unexpected win, and that scratch was a cliffhanger. That his scratch brought the number of horses scratched from the 149th running of the race to a total of five was mind-boggling to begin with. But his scratch was by far the one that most changed the race.

We can call the scratch one that was made in an abundance of caution. Here is how it worked: Forte let his trainer know that his right front foot was a bit tender late last week, and the barn had him reshod with a three-quarters shoe. Pletcher sent him out for a gallop in the new shoe on race-day morning — itself an extremely rare decision for Pletcher on race day, and especially so for a top favorite on Kentucky Derby race day.

Axiomatically, this triggered a backdrop of intense barn- and trackside debate, first and most obviously because the horse was so widely held, in Vegas and internationally, and at Churchill since the windows had opened for Oaks day on Friday. To say that Forte had been scrutinized for months as a top Derby favorite by players and by the industry at large is an understatement. Adding to the intensity, a Saturday gallop was a strong indication of two possibilities: 1) that the trainer and barn privately knew something was up and wanted to see how the colt was doing, and/or 2) that the trainer and Forte’s connections were being instructed to send the colt out for a gallop so that others, with authority over the race, could see how the colt was doing.

Against that deeply portentous backdrop, it’s important to note that Forte was ultimately scratched by a Kentucky Horse Racing Commission veterinarian who checked on the horse. It’s also important to note that Pletcher was reported to have thought that the horse looked fine in and after his Saturday gallop. It’s also important to note that Forte was not, originally, seriously injured and is expected to recover fully from the bruise. Bruises happen. Not just to equine athletes, but to all athletes, whether the sport is an official ‘contact’ sport or not. But let us be crystal clear: In the heat of training or racing, on dirt, turf and on synthetic track surfaces, bruises often happen to equine athletes. There is quite a complex tapestry of professional and medical protocols for dealing with all equine injury pre-race, and, on the morning of the 149th Kentucky Derby, Forte happened into that.

Mike Repole, one of Forte’s principals, made this respectful, and yet somewhat pained observation to the industry press outside the Pletcher barn after the historic scratch: “There was a bruise. If this race was on (last) Tuesday, he’d be running. If this race was next Saturday, he’d be running. I think the (veterinarians) were overly cautious, but I have to understand and respect the fact that they’re overly cautious. This horse might have not run in five states today, and he might have run in six states today.”

As we know, the race went ahead and, for their part, the players moved swiftly on to Angel of Empire, who promptly went off at 9-2, and he showed.

Not connected to Forte’s injury but unfortunately entwined with it in timing and proximity, seven horses died racing at Churchill in the runup up to the Derby, the last two of whom died racing on the Derby Day undercard. Two of the five who died in the week before the Derby were trained by Barbadian trainer Saffie Joseph Jr., who was, on May 4, suspended indefinitely from racing by Churchill, causing his Derby entry, Lord Miles, to be scratched.

Beginning with the first Joseph trainee’s death in a race on April 30, and with each of the seven deaths at Churchill as the week wore on, a wholly understandable pall deepened strongly over Kentucky’s traditional rites of spring. Naturally, Churchill promptly announced a full investigation of every aspect of trainers and owners bringing those horses to race.

As in all sports both human and equine, flat racing was not seriously regulated until the latter part of the 20th century — in fact it’s possible to argue that that very timeline occurred in all American animal husbandry, whether in sport, agriculture or simple in pet care. That some racehorses die racing is a fact — and for the sport, not to mention the public, any number of those deaths is too high. According to recent statistics, that number is low and appreciably declining, hovering between one and two horse fatalities per 1000 starts, according to the Jockey Club.

Currently engaged in a decades-long industry-wide debate precisely over strenghtening medical and medicinal protocols for the benefit of equine athletes, Thoroughbred racing hardly needed the events of the last week at Churchill, let alone having a series of deaths occur in the very week that the klieg lights of international attention shine brightest on the track, the Derby, and thus on Kentucky.

Statistically rare as the deaths at Churchill in the last week were, ironically, Kentucky, the ancestral American home of Thoroughbred breeding and racing, has one of the nation’s best, in the sense of most strict, regulatory systems for protecting athletes. The case in point is the the two-year banning of 6-time Derby winning trainer Bob Baffert for his barn’s treatment of Derby winner Medina Spirit with the — in Kentucky — banned treatment on race days of the corticosteriod betamethasone.

That noted, and pending the Churchill and Kentucky Horse Racing Commission look into the deaths, very much including a deep post-mortem look into the athletes themselves, the jury is out on Mr. Joseph and the other trainers involved.