California coach David Wayne Baker is serving a 15-day suspension that started Feb. 14 questioning whether or not he’ll ever be capable to keep away from an analogous penalty sooner or later.
Baker, who has been a coach for 40 years, received sanctioned Feb. 13 for a optimistic post-race take a look at exhibiting the presence of a metabolite for the anesthetic mepivacaine in a 3-year-old filly named Mars Magic . The urine pattern was collected after the filly received an allowance race Sept. 7 at Ferndale for proprietor/breeder Susan White, who races and breeds as Packsaddle Street.
The Kenneth L. Maddy Equine Analytical Chemistry Laboratory (College of California-Davis) detected 3-hydroxymepivacaine, a metabolite of mepivacaine, in Mars Magic’s post-race pattern. Baker and White requested that the B pattern be examined as nicely and Industrial Laboratories in Denver confirmed the discovering.
Baker tried to battle the penalty throughout a Feb. 5 listening to earlier than the Horseracing Integrity and Welfare Unit’s inside adjudication panel. Along with the 15-day suspension, he has been fined $1,000 and needed to forfeit $19,500 in prize cash.
“I attempted to battle it on the grounds of contamination,” Baker instructed BloodHorse. “This take a look at undoubtedly was not from something I or any of my workers did to this horse. Now we have the data that the horse by no means received this from my vet. I believed we had a great case.”Join BloodHorse Each day
He additionally thought his uneventful regulatory historical past would possibly assist. Since 2005 (way back to digital data can be found), Baker has had one optimistic take a look at for phenylbutazone in a horse he was working to get off the vet’s checklist in August 2023. The horse had been handled in line with the advisable 72-hour withdrawal time previous to its work and nonetheless had a take a look at consequence barely above the regulatory threshold, in line with Baker.
“I received fined $500 for that however I’ve by no means had some other optimistic. I am virtually 66, why would I begin dishonest now?” he stated.
Alongside together with his vet data exhibiting his horse had not been given mepivacaine, Baker tried to make the case that contamination is feasible on a number of events.
“There are a minimum of 15 folks out of my management who contact my horse on race day,” he stated. “From the state vets, the horse riders, the beginning gate crew, the jockey, the grooms, two scorching walkers, and many house owners that come by.
“I ran a special horse two weeks in the past at Santa Anita, and the horse bit its tongue within the publish parade,” he continued. “So proper earlier than they loaded her (within the gate), they grabbed a towel and began wiping out her mouth. Who is aware of what was on that towel or in the event that they wiped one other horse’s mouth with that towel? That’s how straightforward it may be, what number of alternatives for contamination there are.”
With trainers bearing the last word accountability, Baker stated he believes trainers want some extra assist from racetracks and regulators. For instance, he stated, each stall in a take a look at barn must be geared up with a digital camera. At Ferndale, Pleasanton, and Golden Gate Fields, Baker stated urine samples are collected behind closed doorways after which the accompanying scorching walkers or grooms are anticipated to signal a press release confirming they witnessed the gathering.
“However all they witnessed was the horse strolling into the stall after which somebody popping out of the stall with urine in a cup. If the coach goes to be accountable, there must be cameras so I do know that’s my horse’s urine,” he stated.
A coach’s interval of ineligibility could possibly be diminished underneath the Anti-Doping and Treatment Management Program guidelines if a listening to officer finds “no fault/negligence” or “no important fault/negligence.” Baker didn’t qualify for both, which he suspects is expounded to a therapy the filly received for surgical procedure 4 months after her post-race take a look at. Once more, he believes a clear file ought to have carried some weight. Â
“Throughout the listening to, nevertheless, I saved getting requested if the filly had ever been handled with mepivacaine and I stated ‘no.’ A report will get put up on the display screen exhibiting that the horse was given this drug,” Baker recalled. “However that was 4 months after the race when she was being handled for a saucer fracture. The therapy was by no means in my vet payments as a result of the horse was not even in my care on the time.”
