Lintner: 3 thoughts amid Santa Anita Park's uncertain future

Answers to a number of questions about the suspension of racing at Santa Anita Park could be answered any hour now.

When can racing resume? What happens to important scheduled stakes, such as the San Felipe (G2) meant to mark the 3-year-old debuts of Kentucky Derby prospects Game Winner and Improbable? And, most important, what the heck has caused this rash of fatalities?

RELATED: Full statement on Santa Anita's closure

As we wait, a few topics first seemed worth a further look.

They’ve been here before

While reflecting on his career during last year’s Triple Crown season, trainer D. Wayne Lukas made a striking comment. Paraphrasing here — the audio file is long since deleted from my recorder — Lukas said he years ago decided to base his consolidating stable in Kentucky assuming it would be the last place they’d ever stop racing horses.

Given the size of Santa Anita’s media market and increase in activism for animal welfare, there has been at least mild concern on social media that this spate of fatalities could spell the end for The Great Race Place — that this could be the moment the valuable parcel of land is realized as condominiums or retail space or anything more profitable than its current form.

But it seems way too soon to make that leap, especially since fewer than three years ago, Del Mar was in a similar public relations position given 17 deaths during its 2016 meet. Similarly, activists called for action. The next year, there were just six fatalities reported. And the year after that, in 2017, Del Mar successfully hosted the Breeders’ Cup for the first time.

The championships are scheduled to return to Santa Anita this fall for a record 10th time. It’s worth noting that in commenting on his track’s increased safety, Del Mar Thoroughbred Club president Joe Harper credited trackman Dennis Moore — brought on this week as a consultant at Santa Anita — for turning things around.

The great surface debate

Santa Anita in 2010 became the first track to switch back to dirt after a 2006 mandate that California facilities install synthetic surfaces. In 2014, renovations to install a covering of drought-friendly “El Segundo” sand were underway, with the process overseen by Moore.

And that leads to an interesting debate just last month between Racing TV host Nick Luck and trainer Michael Dickinson, the “mad genius” who also runs the Tapeta Footings company in Maryland.

“All racing taxes the mind and intestinal fortitude of a horse,” Dickinson said during the discussion. “But dirt racing stretches the body more than is necessary and more than often beyond breaking point. Dirt racing can’t survive without a shed-load of medication and too many fatalities.”

Asked a solution by Luck — should all dirt racing go away completely? — Dickinson cited an increased number of trainers voluntarily turning toward turf in the U.S.

“It’s a question of whether we ask them a reasonable level of risk,” said Luck, who often appears on NBC’s American racing coverage. “You’re saying, and I agree with you in part, that on the dirt we don’t ask them a reasonable level of risk. I would suggest that at the top level I’m satisfied with it, but further down the scale quickly in America it is not sufficiently well-regulated. The tracks are not especially well-maintained.”

See the full video below:

Climate change’s impact

After the filly Lets Light the Way broke down Tuesday morning during her workout, trainer Ron McAnally told the Daily Racing Form, “To me, it’s the weather” causing it.

Small sample size, yes, but since this trend at Santa Anita became national news with the Feb. 23 death of Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile winner Battle of Midway, there have been an additional three fatalities combining both racing and training.

Including Battle of Midway, those four injured horses in all were either running over an off track at the time of their breakdowns or had done so in their previous race. That makes for a chicken and egg situation.

Did a dry track, deemed fine by an on-site expert but now under further examination, produce the injuries? Or did the breakdowns originate from issues running back from a sloppy track effort last out?

Either way, Santa Anita in the future will have to adjust for more volatile weather patterns. That’s the reality of climate change.

According to the Los Angeles Almanac website, rainfall was +2.77 inches above average in January and +4.56 inches above average in February in downtown LA. That follows the 2017-2018 season in which only 4.79 inches fell in total from July 1 to June 30.

And those are just a few things to think about while we wait for more answers.