X-ray expertise helps power yearling market

Cover image by Lesley Warwick courtesy of Westbury Stud

Dr Lawler, one of Australia's most experienced and respected equine vets, has backed the expertise of his profession when assessing x-rays of developing thoroughbreds and believes x-rays have played a crucial role in the growth in the yearling market in the past 20 years.

He assesses x-rays from thousands of yearlings and weanlings on behalf of buyers and vendors each year and has witnessed the continued development of expertise in the area since x-rays were introduced into the Australian sales landscape in 2002.

Speaking extensively to TDN AusNZ, Dr Lawler dismissed a perception among some breeders, agents and vendors that the understanding around thoroughbred radiography by vets has not evolved in recent years.

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"The more time has gone on, the more experienced they've got. Whereas previously they may have rated a horse as being high risk, now that category only comes for horses that it is believed will not go to the races," he said.

"The number of horses being classified as high risk now has diminished greatly from when it first started.

"You also need to remember when it first started in the early 2000s, you would get 60 or 70 veterinarians arrive at a Magic Millions Sale. Economic pressures and performance results have seen that number decrease rapidly, and now you have probably got 15-20 that are going there. It tends to be the same people that are going to most of the sales."

Dr Lawler said the transparency offered by the availability of x-rays had helped grow confidence of investors, which has played a major role in increasing returns to breeders in Australia.

"What it has done is it has dramatically increased buyer confidence. We have seen averages at sales increase year after year and if we took those radiographs and scopes away, have a look at what will happen to the yearling prices. They will plummet," he said.

"I think it's improved immeasurably from where it was and I think the number of people that are vocal about it are in the minority. Most people have the confidence as far as their veterinarian is concerned."

He said that it was important for the Australian industry to not only meet international industry standards but help set them when it came to providing information for prospective buyers.

"There is no doubt that there are vendors out there that would love to see x-rays done away with, but I don’t know if they realise the damage they would be doing to the value of their own drafts," he said.

"They might want to go back to how horses were sold many, many years ago, but if Australia wants to keep up with what is happening internationally, we need to offer international buyers, who are crucial for that top end of the market, at least the level of expectation that they might get at Kentucky or Tattersalls or Arqana."

Clients often dictate risk approach

One of the key variables in Dr Lawler's work in assessing thoroughbreds ahead of sales is working with the different expectations of clients and their various appetites for risks. That is a key factor in his assessment of horses.

"You might have someone akin to a Danny O'Brien, or back in the day, Guy Walter, who is prepared to give a horse a lot of time and not put any pressure on it early. In that instance, you can be far more forgiving in your assessment of a set of radiographs compared to someone who wants a horse up and running early," he said.

"You might have a stallion syndicate, who is trying to win one of these Group 1 2-year-old races, and they want to be able to put the blowtorch to those horses early on. Individual buyers, you might have different advice for and different levels of acceptance."

Other buyers who may prefer a horse with a complete clean slate are pinhookers, who are becoming an increasingly active part of the market. They often attract Hong Kong buyers from breeze-up sales or trials, meaning their purchases must stand up to both the rigours of sales preparations and Hong Kong's famously high standard for x-rays.

Cosmetic surgery an area of concern

The desirability of clean x-rays is something which has led to an increasing amount of surgeries for young horses to rectify small defects which while they are highly unlikely to impact a racehorse's future soundness, may impact their desirability at a yearling sale.

Bloodstock agent Sheamus Mills is very much a supporter of the transparency that x-rays provide but raised these 'clean-up' surgeries as a possible equine welfare concern in a recent TDN AusNZ article.

Dr Lawler said that the growing amount of unnecessary surgeries on young horses for cosmetic reasons were also something which concerned him.

"There are certain operative procedures which I am not in favour of, which I do believe are cosmetic," he said.

"I have tried to educate my buyers and investors alike that there are certain procedures, which while they may take away any comment on the horse, won't change the assessment of the horse from an experienced veterinarian.

"The glowing example of that is hind-fetlock chips, front or back. Any horse like that which doesn't have large swollen joints, it doesn't impact my assessment. Their racetrack performance, their number of starts and average prizemoney earned is the same as the normal population.

"Morally, I find it disturbing that people will opt to do those procedures."

Dr Lawler said he does understand the commercial reasons behind the decision to operate in those circumstances, but it is not something he is comfortable with recommending himself.

The questions around surgeries in young horses are not black and white and Lawler said there are instances where he would recommend surgery on a horse that has issues which could impact their soundness in campaigning as a 2-year-old.

The x-ray exceptions

The argument against the value of pre-sale x-rays is often mounted with evidence of a host of elite horses who have failed an x-ray test and then gone on to perform at the top level.

But Dr Lawler says his long experience, and extensive array of collected data, indicates these horses are in the vast minority.

"One thing I see a lot of is vendors coming out with the exception, rather than the rule. I can understand that. But they will say, 'look at this great horse we have, it's great and all the vets have bagged it'," he said.

"They always remember the one in 100 that comes out and performs well. I don't blame breeders for doing that, but it does happen."

Five-time Group 1 champion Elvstroem (Danehill {USA}) is often used as a pin-up boy for those who 'failed the x-ray', but Dr Lawler says he recalls that as a yearling in 2002, that horse only fell short of the very stringent Hong Kong requirements.

"Elvstroem had OCDs in both front fetlocks that were fragmented. Given time and taken along slowly, there was every likelihood that it was going to resolve and he was going to be ok," he said.

"The people that wanted to buy him said they'd like the horse to pass the Hong Kong protocol, because if the horse got up and trialling they would then be able to entertain Hong Kong offers.

"He didn't meet the Hong Kong protocols, but it didn’t mean he failed the x-rays. He very quickly became the banner horse for everybody to use."

He said vendors needed to realise that there were always two sides to the x-ray situation.

"There might be stories that vendors say they have been cruelled by the veterinarians, but when they go and buy a horse themselves, they get their vet to check it out for sure. From start to finish, you can't have your cake and eat it," he said.

Data available for study

Dr Lawler's 20 years of collected data, plus the repositories of the major sales companies, would make an ideal basis for a broader Australian study on how x-ray issues impact horse soundness and performance.

That study is not one that Dr Lawler himself has time to conduct and when he did broach the concept with the Racing Industry Participants Advisory Committee (RIPAC), it wasn’t something high on their agenda.

"They say some of the data has been done before in America. But I think there will be a response from the vendors to address that, given dirt tracks in America is completely different to what we have here.

"As far as educating the entire industry, that's not my role. That's something RIPAC can do and someone at a university can examine."

For the reasons suggested above and for a multitude of others, in appears the contention around x-rays is not something which will be resolved any time soon.

"I'd love it to be black and white, but unfortunately it’s not," Dr Lawler said.