Racehorses at mercy of tendons

I’ll Have Another won’t have a Triple Crown due to one of the most commonplace of thoroughbred injuries.

The Canadian-owned Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner was scratched from Saturday’s Belmont Stakes and retired after developing tendinitis in his left foreleg.

“Tendinitis is just inflammation of the tendon . . . a strained tendon,” says Dr. Brian Van Arem, who practices out of Woodbine Raceway. “It’s a serious injury, or can be.”

In I’ll Have Another’s case, the tissue in question is the superficial digital flexor tendon located between the knee and ankle in the back of the horse’s left foreleg, Van Arem says. “It could have been caused by a twist, a bad step, a step in a hole, just anything that way.”

Van Arem says it’s the secondmost common injury — after bone chips — that horses are scratched from races.

He says the condition is not typically career threatening, despite I’ll Have Another’s being put out to stud. “Is it life-threatening? No. Is it going to cause lameness? Yes.”

Dr. Darryl Bonder, of the Toronto Equine Hospital, says swelling associated with tendinitis is almost always caused by a tear to the tissue.

And, in I’ll have Another’s case, ultrasound imaging of the tear likely showed it was severe enough to warrant retirement, especially since the colt is now worth much more as a stud horse than a purse winner, Bonder says.

“If they really loved the horse and wanted to avoid all possibility of future injury, based upon the information they gleaned from the ultrasound, they may just say . . .‘that’s the end of it.’ ”

Dr. Lance Bassage, of the University of Guelph’s Ontario Veterinary College, says it’s likely the horse could race in the Belmont without causing a catastrophic injury. But he says the horse is worth too much as a sire to take risks.

“Right now he is worth as much as any horse — as a breeding horse — on the face of the planet,” Bassage says. “All he can do from here is go downhill. He can’t do anything to raise his value.”

He says tendon injuries like I’ll have Another’s are now being treated in research and clinical settings with stem cell therapies.