From the Panama City News Herald comes speculation similar to ours that steroid withdrawal played a role in the big bust delivered by Big Brown...from someone who knows the game.
Like millions of horse racing fans, Richard Alker was captivated by the possibility of Big Brown winning the Triple Crown Saturday in the Belmont Stakes.
And just like many of them, Alker has a theory to why the thoroughbred suddenly came up empty when urged on by jockey Kent Desormeaux.
Alker is the veterinarian at the Panama City Animal Hospital and Equine Center and a thoroughbred owner. He believes that Big Brown was a healthy horse during the Belmont. He thinks, however, that skipping a scheduled monthly injection of the anabolic steroid Winstrol combined with excessive heat and fatigue produced Big Brown's disappointing finish.
"They took him off of steroids and that caused the problem," Alker said. "If you get a horse used to those for their recovery, the benefits that provides for muscles and the things that steroids do for them, and you take it off of it there is a letdown.
"And even though the horse wasn't on an abusive dose of steroids, it could have still caused an effect that was certainly detrimental to them."...
Alker said there's typically a six- to eight-week letdown time frame after a horse is taken off steroids. Saturday's race was seven-and-a-half weeks since Big Brown's last injection on April 15.
"If it had been on a year, then off for six, seven months, his body would have been used to not having them," Alker said. "But because he quit them in that time frame there's this kind of letdown then, I think, that's certainly possible it was a mistake."
Alker and his wife, Natalie, are part of an investment group that buys and sells mares, in addition to breeding them.
Fatigue and heat on Saturday also could have affected Big Brown, Alker said. Racing three times in five weeks at distances 1¼ miles or longer is nearly unheard of in horse racing, except during Triple Crown races.
Interesting that the vet owns a piece of history: the daughter of Affirmed, the last Triple Crown winner.
Another voice that agrees here.
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