Posted: 11 Aug 2010 10:40 PM PDT

John Petti was just joking Tuesday afternoon when he stepped onto the deck outside the horse racing office at the Missoula County Fairgrounds.

The racing secretary for Montana Downs cupped hands to mouth and proclaimed to the general barn area: "The draw's starting in five minutes."

It wasn't that Petti's announcement of the upcoming draw for post positions in Friday's race card fell on deaf ears. There just weren't many ears for it to fall on.

Oh, there are plenty of horses entered - a surprising 11 races' worth each day, and an average of seven per race on Friday and six on Saturday. Not bad for the inaugural card of a mere two-day race meet, the first since 2006 at the Western Montana Fair.

It was just that the horses and horsemen weren't there yet. Barns on the backside of the track were still nearly as vacant as they've been the past three years when there was no racing at all.

"It's the first meet I've ever worked where

95 percent of our entries are being taken over the phone," Petti said between cell phone calls Wednesday as he tried to cobble together Saturday's card. "It makes it difficult and stressful at times."

When the horsemen and horsewomen aren't on the grounds, Petti explained, he can't call them into the office, look them in the eye, and work with them to match their horses with his races.

Most of the horses entered this weekend are still in Great Falls, which ran in late July and early August, or in Kalispell, which runs a two-day meet of its own Aug. 21-22 at the Northwest Montana Fair.

"We've got more horses applying and entering than we had horses programmed for," said Eric Spector, president and chief executive officer of Montana Downs, who plans on being in town for the races. "Both days will be big race days with decent fields and very competitive fields.

"The only difference relative to what everybody's used to seeing in Missoula is this will be a ship-in facility."

Montana Downs had a successful second year of racing at Great Falls in late July and early August.

"We had a great meet in Great Falls. Our handle was up 12 percent," Petti said. "I'm not sure what to expect here after all these years. Maybe we can get this rain out of here by the weekend and we'll do well."

Petti calls his position "racing secretary, et. al." He's the morning-line maker, the stall man, the race program composer and editor, and at other tracks, the track announcer. Bruce Micklus, Missoula's longtime track voice, will return for those duties this week.

***

This is his summer job. The day after the races wrap up, Petti will be on the road to Mountain Home, Idaho, where school starts Tuesday. He's the speech and debate teacher at Mountain Home High, and he coaches a debate team that ranks among the top 50 in the nation.

But before there was teaching, there was racing. Petti cut his teeth at Los Alamitos in California and got his first job in the business there in 1979.

"Most horse people here in Idaho and Montana, they come through this business from the horse side," he said. "I come from the gambling side. I was a player, and I liked to go to the track, got a job at the track, blah blah blah, and worked my way up."

He worked New Mexico tracks in Albuquerque and Santa Fe. Back to Los Alamitos, and on to Les Bois in Boise, Idaho, near his current home. Last year, Petti was track announcer at Spector's Wyoming Downs in Evanston. There was no race meet in Evanston this summer, and Petti agreed to take on his current duties at the Montana races.

He was joined at the Missoula office this week by Jenny May, whose title for current purposes is operations manager. Like racing secretary, it encompasses a broad range of duties.

An accountant when she's not at the racetrack, May helps in the race office receiving entries, serves as the horsemen's bookkeeper, oversees a gift shop program on the front side and, on occasion, does the jockeys' laundry.

"We have done that," she allowed of the laundry job. "When we've had to we've taken it back to the hotel and thrown it all in the washers and done it there. I mean, basically whatever it takes to get it done."

May brought along her own work force from home in Fountain Valley, Calif. Jake celebrates his 13th birthday Saturday, Amanda is 11, and Isaac 9. May said her children look forward to summers at the track, and all three work in the front-side gift shop selling Montana Downs shirts and caps, keychains and jockey rubber ducks.

Unlike Petti, May has little background in racing. She first set foot on a racetrack less than four years ago.

"I needed a job, basically," she said. "I had moved, and when I was looking for a new place I went to work with Wyoming Entertainment, which is the Wyoming company that does pretty much the same thing as this."

Duayne Didericksen was expected into town from Boise on Wednesday. A respected racing official and director of the American Quarter Horse Association, he'll be the director of racing operations, as he was at Great Falls and, in past years, at Wyoming Downs.

***

May and Spector said the Western Montana Turf Club has been a big help, capitalizing on its experience and local ties to collect sponsorships and supply amenities such as morning coffee and doughnuts to the backside. The turf club, headed by the wife and husband team of Toni Hinton and Jim Johnson, was one of the most active around when racing was suspended after the 2006 meet.

"They've pretty much told me let us know what you need done and we'll take care of it," May said. "Without overwhelming them, I'm doing that. I'm trying to walk that fine line between, OK, here's my job - you do it."

Understandably, there've been a few curves as the race meet approaches. The starting gate at the fairgrounds had timing problems, May said, so Ryan Sherman, the executive secretary of the Montana Board of Horse Racing, asked Montana Downs to haul its starting gate in from Great Falls.

As the rain fell Tuesday, some saw a need for more sand on the parts of the track that sat fallow for four years. Money was found from a fairgrounds facilities fund, and Spector said on Wednesday a respected circle of racing people in Missoula have assured him the surface is just fine.

"We're working the track, lots of advice, lots of hard workers," new fairground director Steve Earle said. "No question about it, we'll be ready."

"The first year in Great Falls was very chaotic and very hectic in terms of who's doing what," May pointed out. "The second year, a lot of that had been established, we knew what to expect, and it was a lot easier. We'll get the wrinkles ironed out and next year will be better."

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Horse racing wrestles with complex drug problem

Posted: 12 Aug 2010 08:42 PM PDT

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By Gary West

gwest@ star-telegram.com

Today, he could become the all-time winner; Monday, he could become the all-time loser. That dichotomy distills and summarizes the confusion and uncertainty caused by horse racing's drug problem.

This isn't one of those old Howard Hawks Westerns, where the good guys and the bad guys are clearly defined and where John Wayne would never confuse one for the other. This is an extremely complex situation, where appearances can be deceptive and where right and wrong can be blurred by practicality and procedure and even contamination.Then again, maybe one element of the old Western remains. John Wayne would never allow the hang-'em-high crowd to arbitrate justice. And the New Mexico Racing Commission can assume John Wayne's role Monday.If he wins the $50,000 Classic Handicap tonight at Sam Houston, Stolis Winner will become the richest Quarter Horse in history; he'll be the sport's all-time leading money winner. With a victory -- and he's the 5-2 favorite in the morning line -- he would push his earnings to $2,127,731 and surpass by $1,421 the great Refrigerator.And Monday, the first item on the agenda for a meeting of the New Mexico Racing Commission is the disqualification of Stolis Winner from the world's richest Quarter Horse race. If it's upheld, Stolis Winner's earnings will tumble to $1.1 million.On Jan. 8, 2008, four months after he won the $1.9 million All-American, a Board of Stewards in effect disqualified Stolis Winner because postrace urine and blood samples tested "positive" for caffeine. The ruling also imposed a fine of $1,500 and a suspension of six months on the horse's trainer, Heath Taylor.Insisting they did nothing wrong, Taylor and the horse's owner, Jerry Windham of College Station, appealed. Claiming no knowledge of how Stolis Winner might have tested "positive," they probably sounded like many who have been caught reaching into the sport's cookie jar. But, of course, some who proclaim they're innocent actually are.A hearing panel appointed by the commission investigated. And its report reads like a treatise on the complexity of the drug problem and on the absurdity of no-tolerance rules. The report also makes the point that when it comes to medication and drugs in horse racing, appearances can be deceptive, and so can "positive" tests.Blood and urine samples were drawn from all 10 horses in the All-American. Initially, all the urine samples tested negative for banned substances. But the blood sample taken from Stolis Winner was identified as "suspicious," and so additional testing was ordered.That led to the discovery of the caffeine, specifically 125 nanograms per milliliter in Stolis Winner's urine. But that was just an "estimate." Yes, a horse was disqualified from a $1.9 million race and a trainer suspended for six months because of an estimate.A more accurate test found 84.2 nanograms. A nanogram, by the way, is a billionth of a gram; a congress of nanograms could convene on the head of a pin, but modern testing has become so sensitive that it would find them.

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Leader in California horse racing dies in Oregon plane crash

Posted: 12 Aug 2010 11:17 AM PDT

Frank "Scoop" Vessels III, one of the most influential leaders of California's horse racing industry, was killed in a small plane crash Wednesday in southeast Oregon.

According to authorities, Vessels and architect Sam Cannell of Anderson died instantly when the twin-engine Aero Commander 500-B crashed in a remote area 70 miles south of Burns, Ore., on its way to Montana from Redding for a fishing trip.

Vessels, 58, owns Vessels Stallion Farm in north San Diego County and was past president of the California Thoroughbred Breeders Association as well as the American Quarter Horse Association. Before the state legislature, he championed both breeds in Sacramento.

Vessels, a member of the prestigious Jockey Club, also gained national prominence. In 2003, he received racing's John Galbraith Award, named for the founder of the Breeders' Cup, for outstanding entrepreneurship and innovation in the equine industry.

"One achievement, which is significant and unusual in this industry, is that Scoop attained world-class success in both quarter horses and thoroughbreds," said Rick Wilke of the University of Louisville in presenting the award. "A lot of people dabble in both breeds, but no one has ever reached a pinnacle of success with each."

Vessels was the grandson of Frank Vessels, founder of Los Alamitos Race Course and a quarter horse racing pioneer. After the family sold the racetrack and its adjacent Orange County farm in 1984, Scoop turned a former cattle ranch near Bonsall into a 400-acre state-of-the-art horse breeding farm, branching out into thoroughbreds as well as quarter horses. Today, Vessels Stallion Farm ranks among the nation's top thoroughbred as well as quarter horse breeders.

Vessels is survived by his wife, Bonnie, and sons Bryan, Colt and Kash.

Cannell, 73, also was a horse breeder and owner. He is survived by four daughters.

The cause of the crash has not been determined. The National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Aviation Administration are investigating.

Call The Bee's Debbie Arrington, (916) 321-1075.

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Horse Racing

Thursday, August 12, 2010

“Horse racing gallops back to Missoula fairgrounds” plus 2 more

“Horse racing gallops back to Missoula fairgrounds” plus 2 more

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