Bob Baffert, a coach of 45 years, may have spent four hours of his career on January 27 when he testified on day four of a case instigated and instigated by the New York Racing Association. request the suspension of his driver’s license.
Baffert was called to the stand by his attorney, W. Craig Robertson III after a late lunch break and began with a positive note after being asked in connection with the receipt of some impressive awards. .
He went on to say that for decades he had been training without a drug test in New York and had never been called by an NYRA official to express concern about any drug positives. out-of-state drugs — until later Medina Spirit Victory of the Kentucky Derby presented by Woodford Reserve (G1).
In what must now be like the good old days, Baffert says he has been sought after by the NYRA and politicians both from top to bottom, having won the Triple Crown at Belmont Park with American pharoah in the best experience he had at a track, installed in Racecourse Saratogaof the Walk of Fame alongside the sport’s giants, and shared a humorous chat with Secretariat owner/breeder Penny Chenery in Saratoga. And then, before he knew it, all hell broke loose.
Baffert, frustrated and betrayed by the NYRA’s suspension of his activities in New York, where it is currently banned, could continue to race there, but he is operating under a cloud, a cloud that the NYRA says he created himself.
Baffert spent most of his in-person examination during Thursday’s hearing trying to explain all his drug positives, which began with Cruel Intent in July 2019 at Del Mar meet and conclude with the 2021 Kentucky Derby on the first Saturday in May. But at the end of his explanations, some of them are simple, some of them are contradictory, one thing remains. Details of the actual NYRA charges against him have remained the same.
The drug cases, and their inner truths, go on and on.
Quack and Gamine tested positive for lidocaine on the day of the Arkansas Derby (G1) in 2020. But Nadal , who won the second division of the Arkansas Derby, did not. Assistant trainer Jimmy Barnes treated all three horses after using lidocaine patches for back pain on Thursday and Friday mornings, but only two showed up with Category 2 substance. The horse ran second. Charlatan was also positive for lidocaine (but below the threshold), but Barnes never touched it. Is there environmental contamination in the test barn? If so, why did Baffert’s attorney put out a media fact sheet two months later alluding to Barnes’ lidocaine patch?
Merneith tested positive for the cough suppressant dextrorphan. His groom took pills containing this substance. Did he pee in Merneith’s straw? No, he told an investigator. Yes, he said later in an affidavit.
Gamine tested positive for betamethasone after Longines Kentucky Oaks (G1) in 2020, but she was injected four days before the withdrawal deadline. “I called Dr. Carpenter and told him, and he said ‘it’s impossible’ … (but) I have to accept the penalty because the law is the law,” said Baffert. Disqualification for being placed in the Oaks and fined Despite being disqualified, Gamine’s owner, Michael Lund Petersen, maintained a cynical attitude towards the coach.
Then, Baffert said, he “instructed my vets that I didn’t want betamethasone injections anymore, didn’t want it in my cage.” However, Medina Spirit turned positive after the Derby, and Baffert lost his usual composure. He held a press conference in front of his warehouse and the next day he was in a round of television interviews when he said some things he regrets.
“I was very upset,” he said on Thursday. “This is the greatest race in America, and that horse has drained my heart. I feel like I owe it to its owner, and I want people to know something’s wrong.”
But what went wrong, that is the question. As hinted at the hearing, Baffert said all but then that he was the victim of a conspiracy, that he was a victim of a cancellation culture, that there was something wrong with the execution racing, and all the problems come from sources other than him.
Not only did he deny Medina Spirit was injected during his media tour, he also admitted today he said in one of his TV interviews, “Nobody handles the horse has any cream or anything like that, so we just don’t know where it’s coming from.” But a few days later, and now, that’s exactly what he maintains happened.
At the time, “it never crossed my mind (betamethasone is available in another form),” Baffert said at the New York hearing. A few days later, “Dr. Baker called me and said it could be in the form of a topical ointment.”
Baffert, with the help of Robertson, released a statement shortly before Preakness (G1) expressing regret for saying hurtful things after what he called a “gut punch” upon learning of the positive news. with drugs. Now, Baffert said, his understanding of the results of a urine sample tested in New York proved betamethasone came from an Otomax ointment used to treat skin rashes.
Under questioning by NYRA attorney Henry Greenberg, Baffert admitted he was on record for saying, “I take pride in operating a tight ship and know the rules in every state.” But it was revealed that Baffert didn’t realize Kentucky’s threshold for betamethasone had changed from 10 picograms per milliliter to a detectable level a week before Gamine tested positive after Oaks – but he did know the threshold. days, and it has been observed.
Baffert admits he has been cited and fined 14 times during his career for bute, including an average of six in the 2000s, and that he has at least 25 drug violations during his career with total of 31 violations. He asserted that all averages were innocent mistakes by veterinarians.
The hints of a conspiracy theory don’t begin with Medina Spirit. A post-2019 CHRB investigative report letter assessed as Cruel Intent and Eclair Baffert told the investigator “he thought someone was intentionally donating his horse meat and mentioned that he would be offering a reward to help solve the case.” On Thursday, Baffert said he joked, then turned around and said he was upset, and then admitted “it turned out to be a mistake.”
In an attempt to discredit Baffert, Greenberg demonstrated that the trainer said he opposed a complete ban on anabolic steroid use in 2007 because, in his words, “I think that’s fine for some horses that are recovering.” Now, Baffert said, the ban “doesn’t really matter,” meaning the ban doesn’t do any harm.
Following on from the hearing’s recurring theme that Baffert’s stockpile had six drugs on average over 14 months, Greenberg released Baffert’s statement to BloodHorse in November 2020 that he would retain Dr. adding an extra layer of protection to ensure the health of the horses in my care and compliance.”
It never happened. Baffert maintained at the hearing Hore, who is based in Kentucky, has been unable to fill the position because the pandemic has prevented travel to California. Baffert said he finally got someone to help resolve compliance issues seven months after the BloodHorse interview — and a month after Medina Spirit failed.
Baffert’s infamous use of the term “cancellation culture” to describe the uproar after Medina Spirit’s positive test results were revealed, he said at the hearing, he said at the hearing. wrong choice of words that should never have been used. Greenberg seems to accept the coach is really stubborn.
Although hearing officer O. Peter Sherwood ruled the evidence on the subject unacceptable, Baffert attorney Clark Brewster claimed NYRA board members did not want to take Baffert because of him. race with their horses. At Thursday’s hearing, Greenberg turned the conversation to the fact that the members of the California Horse Racing Board who were sitting in judgment about Evenly Positive for scopolamine after the 2018 Santa Anita Derby (G1), also racing to compete with Baffert. Baffert said he never thought about it. And as it turned out, Baffert was cleared of wrongdoing in that case.
Baffert said the events have harmed him professionally and personally. However, he admitted in his testimony that racing was also harmed.
Greenberg drove home at the point where Baffert was responsible for ensuring that nothing like betamethasone of any kind was “within a million miles” of Medina Spirit so that this “terrible cloud” would not was thrown over the Kentucky Derby. Baffert admitted that he understood the whole situation, to use his words, “appalling”.
After that exchange, it was revealed that a hearing by Kentucky managers on the Medina Spirit case would take place on February 7, and the hearing was adjourned for the day. It is unclear what is scheduled for Friday.
Baffert’s experts
The testimony of Dr. Clara Fenger and Dr. Steven Barker opened the morning session, and they made similar comments when called into the stands by Robertson.
Fenger earned a doctorate in veterinary science from the University of Kentucky, and Barker, also a PhD, was a Louisiana Racing Commission chemist from 1987 to 2016, when he retired.
Both men reviewed records of the average drugs listed in the NYRA allegation, and both said the drugs would have no pharmacological effects, no enhancement effects. performance and does not have the effect of covering the wound. However, they admit, the averages do not comply with the regulation.
The Medina Spirit case, the most important of the charges against Baffert, was the one Fenger did. She was involved in delivering Medina Spirit’s urine samples, along with members of the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission, from Kentucky to Dr. George Maylin for testing in New York. In the meantime, she said, Maylin applied Otomax to animal tests in a research project to see if it could be detected by laboratory testing.
According to Fenger, the urine sample was tested in New York to see if Otomax could “have” a positive result after the Kentucky Derby. She said betamethasone acetate, which is used in the injection, was not detected in the urine sample, and Fenger said that means the horse was not injected. However, this is not the last word. “We treat this as a research project that will be presented for peer review,” she said.
