ASMUSSEN, DUTROW POSITIVES: LIDOCAINE, CLENBUTEROL EXPLAINED
Lidocaine and clenbuterol, the drugs associated with the latest positive tests for Steve Asmussen and Rick Dutrow, are commonly used therapeutic medications with specific uses. Both also have the potential for being abused and are prohibited substances.
The positive tests will be widely covered in the mainstream media because Dutrow and Asmussen are trainers of the two leading Thoroughbreds in America, Kentucky Derby winner Big Brown and 2007 Horse of the Year, Curlin, respectively.
Asmussen’s positive in Texas was for lidocaine, a short-acting anesthetic similar to procaine. Dr. Thomas Brokken, a racetrack practitioner in South Florida and past president of the American Association of Equine Practitioners, said lidocaine is a lot like the numbing anesthetics used by human dentists.
“Usually it’s very short-acting, with a half-life in minutes,” he said. “Normally, I was use it to repair lacerations, suture fillies up behind, or to block horses that are lame and I need to find out where they are lame,” Brokken said. “That’s about all I use it for. Some may use it in an epidural for a horse sore in its back or pelvic area.” A Class 2 drug according to the Association of Racing Commissioners International classifications, lidocaine has a recommended withdrawal time in Texas of 96-120 hours.
Dr. Ron Genovese of the Cleveland Equine Clinic in Ohio, said he no longer uses lidocaine in his practice, preferring to use mepivacaine for lameness examinations and other procedures where an anesthetic is required. Both Dutrow and Asmussen, along with multiple Eclipse Award-winning trainer Todd Pletcher, have been penalized for past mepivacaine positives.
Dutrow’s Kentucky positive was for clenbuterol, a Class 3 drug with a recommended 72-hour withdrawal time in Kentucky (the recommended withdrawal time in New York, where Dutrow is based, is 96 hours). Clenbuterol, typically given to horses daily in the form of the Ventipulmin syrup, is used to help clean up mucus in a horse’s airways.
“A lot of horses have mucus,” Brokken said. “Clenbuterol doesn’t heal anything but it opens the airways to help the macrophages clean up debris in the throat. The macrophages work on oxygen, so if there’s no oxygen they don’t perform well. Clenbuterol opens the airways to oxygen.”
Stephen Reed, a veterinarian at Rood and Riddle Hospital in Lexington, Ky., estimates that 50% or more horses in training have some degree of mucus.
Genovese, who sees horses mainly at Thistledown racetrack in Ohio, said he sees very little use of clenbuterol in his practice. “It’s expensive,” he said. “But mucus is a chronic, irritating factor in the racehorse business. You have to understand that when horses put in bad performances, people have to search for reasons, which is understandable. You can’t talk to the patient. We scope it and and you can see they breathe in a lot of dirt or Polytrack. Many trainers or owners see that and think one and one adds up to two.”
Some trainers racing on circuits with higher purses use the drug on a majority of their horses to help them train more vigorously, since it improves their breathing. “I use that medication on many of my horses and only once can ever remember having a problem with it,” Dutrow told the New York Times.
Clenbuterol is used illegally with other livestock, including sheep and cattle, to produce more defined muscles. “The drug does have a partitioning effect,” Reed said. “It selects for lean body mass. Some trainers use it for a minor anabolic effect. If used correctly for problems in the lungs, however, it can have a great benefit.
“One of the things that worries me,” Reed continued, “is that some of the newer, more sophisticated testing is able to detect levels that couldn’t be therapeutic but would indicate the drug is on board. In the current day and age, regarding medications in any athlete, human or equine, having nothing on board is the way to go. As a bronchialdilator, it has the potential to help. It shouldn’t be given close to the time of racing.”
By Ray Paulick
Copyright ©2008, The Paulick Report
Tags: Big Brown, clenbuterol, Curlin, Horse Racing, lidocaine, mepivacaine, Paulick Report, Ray Paulick, rick dutrow, ron genovese, stephen reed, steve asmussen, thomas brokken
June 26th, 2008 at 11:51 am
So whats new? These guys and many other trainers around the country have been drugging horses for many many years and have been allowed to get away with it.
Make a list of the top 20 trainers in America and 80% of them are cheating. That you can take to the bank!
June 26th, 2008 at 12:21 pm
I think your headlines are extremely misleading……I looked at the rulings for Mr. Dutrow and it appears that many of the “72 Violations did NOT involve drugs…..lack of colors,foal papers , late to the paddock etc…sloppy business practices.
I think your sensationalization is not helpful at this time.
I’m not defending Mr. Dutrow but, most of the drug positives are for permissible medications that are administered by a veterinarian…..horses metabolize drugs at different rates…which can result in an unintended overage.
Mr. Dutrow himself has talked about his checkered past that involves the rulings for pot,bad checks etc.
I did not look at all the rulings for Mr.Asmussen but I would not be surprised if many of the ruling were similar.
A more honest story would focus on the drug positives, especially those that did not involve overages of permissible medications.
Regards,
Mary
June 26th, 2008 at 12:56 pm
“I’m not defending Mr. Dutrow but, most of the drug positives are for permissible medications that are administered by a veterinarian”
Perhaps if that was always the case. The real truth is that it is much cheaper to purchase these medications and administer them yourself. It is not uncommon for many of these trainers to have in their possession various types of injectable drugs.
That within itself is against the rules of racing.
June 26th, 2008 at 1:42 pm
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Dutrow’s 72 violations — 13 medication violations — are put into perspective when one considers that the trainer Larry Jones reportedly has only had one ALLEGATION in 25 years. Thanks to the Paulick Report for not sugar coating the truth. Greater transparency and accountability can only help racing rebound from this challenging time.
June 30th, 2008 at 7:36 pm
I’m not defending either one of the trainers, but they are acting like all 74 violations for Asmussen are for drug violations. They aren’t. I know 19 violations for a horse testing positive isn’t a good record, but some medications are legal, just not on race day, and it could be the horse just didn’t metabolize the medication as fast as they thought it would. Also some of the older violations are for medications that are now legal to use. I hate it that the racing industry is getting such a kick in the face, when the use of medications extends to all areas in the horse industry, not just the racing world. I don’t think the truth has been sugar coated, it’s all out there in black and white for the world to see. I do think the “sensationalization” has hurt the industry, most people just read the headlines and believe them as the truth. They don’t look into the rulings and see how many are actual rulings due to postive drug tests.
July 29th, 2008 at 11:28 am
Clenbuterol is probably the most abused substance in racing today. I hear that many trainers are using the injectable form, I think from Canada, at bridle time or even on the way over to the paddock. The injection is directly into the throat and the effect is immediate with the detection difficult. I believe at least one track on the east coast is taking a close look at this practice, one that has been going on for sometime now and they may even have a few high percentage trainers in their sights.