The sport of horse racing has been around for thousands of years. It started as a game involving horses attached to two-wheeled carts or chariots, with the Greeks leading the way in creating a formal game of competitive running. By the time the Romans arrived, chariot racing had become a major spectator event.
The first races were match races between matched horses with the owners providing the purse and accepting bets. Later, agreements were recorded by disinterested third parties, who became known as keepers of the match books.
By the mid-1700s, standardized rules for horse racing had developed. Races began to be based on a number of factors, including age, sex, birthplace, and performance. During this period, the number of races exploded as new rules were established to attract more spectators and improve the quality of the animals.
One such rule was that only the best four-year-olds would compete in the prestigious King’s Plates. These races required the horses to win two of three heats over 4-mile distances.
Other rules encouraged the use of weights, or allowances. This allowed better horses to beat slower ones by a small margin. The most prized races have weights assigned to each competitor based on their previous winning record and other criteria such as a horse’s speed, sex, trainer, and breed.
Despite their enormous size, the lower legs of racehorses take a brutal beating, straining ligaments and tendons. As a result, many need special shoes and care. Some, like Mongolian Groom, had his lower hind feet wrapped in blue bandages. He also wore a heavy, blue hood to keep his focus on the race and a shadow roll over his nose to prevent him from startling at the shadows on the ground.
In addition to their training and racing, horses need plenty of rest and recovery. A thoroughbred might run a mile in six minutes, but it takes the animal almost nine months to recover from that exertion. This explains why most horse tracks offer their patrons the opportunity to relax in the track’s spa, where they can have a soothing massage and soak in hot tubs.
The sport isn’t without controversy, with groups such as Horseracing Wrongs claiming that the equine athletes are drugged and whipped and pushed to their limits. Some ten thousand American thoroughbreds are slaughtered each year. But for most of the horses who live, a great many are living their work lives in solitary confinement in a stall, where they often become depressed or anxious, according to research by PETA. The resulting injuries and mental trauma can cause them to stop running, or even die. For these reasons, the sport remains controversial for horse lovers and critics alike.