By John Scheinman
Special to The Washington Post
Monday, May 5, 2008; E09

LOUISVILLE, May 4 -- Michael Matz arrived Sunday at the Churchill Downs barn where his horses had stabled during Derby week, having just returned from the Rood & Riddle Equine Hospital in Lexington, Ky.

Matz had gone early in the morning to Rood & Riddle to check on Chelokee, his 4-year-old colt that broke down in the stretch Friday during the Alysheba Stakes. The horse fractured its right front ankle while making a bid for the lead and was given a 50-50 chance of survival.

"I just came back from there, and he looks good," said Matz, who knows all too well the heartbreak of horses injured on the racetrack, having watched Barbaro, his 2006 Kentucky Derby winner, shatter his right hind leg strides out of the gate in the Preakness Stakes at Pimlico. "They'll do the surgery tomorrow to fuse the ankle."

By any measure, this was a difficult weekend for horse racing, with two highly visible on-track breakdowns occurring during one of the few times of year when the general public turns its attention to the sport. Chelokee apparently has a chance to live and go on to a second career in breeding, but Eight Belles, the filly who finished second to Big Brown in the Kentucky Derby, does not.

Having galloped out past the finish line showing no signs of distress, Eight Belles suddenly stopped near the top of the clubhouse turn and collapsed, her front ankles shattered. Moments later, the horse was euthanized on the track in front of a crowd of 157,770.

The filly's death overshadowed the spectacular victory by Big Brown, who became the first horse since 1915 to win the Derby off just three career starts. It also renewed questions about the safety of the sport and its racing surfaces as two horses have died as the result of on-track injuries in Triple Crown races the past three years.

Judging by the large number of comments left by people on newspaper Web sites and blogs after the Derby, many people are grappling with the ethical and moral issues surrounding the racing of horses.

"What can you do? It's unfortunate," Matz said of the breakdowns of Chelokee and Eight Belles. "Good horses like that, that's what makes them good horses. They try so hard.

"I don't think any one of these people [in racing] want to hurt a horse. This poor [groom] who had Chelokee could hardly come to work yesterday. It's not like these are people who want to see a tragedy."

Steve Sexton, the president of Churchill Downs, also framed the moral question about horse racing in personal terms.

"To the casual fan, it's important to know these animals are cared for, as much or more than any athletes," Sexton said Sunday. "When this happens on a national stage, it's very unfortunate."

The Triple Crown series moves to Baltimore in two weeks for the Preakness, and Chris Dragone, president and general manager of Pimlico, hopes people's attention can return to racing.

"Obviously, on the biggest day in racing, I can understand it," Dragone said of the focus on the breakdowns, "but I hope it doesn't take away from the chance to have a real champion in Big Brown."

Asked if he worries about another catastrophe taking place, he said, "I think that's always a worry in this game. It's a worry day to day."

The three Triple Crown races are run on conventional dirt courses and many tracks around the country recently have switched to artificial surfaces to try to address the frequency of injuries. The development has created deep divisions within the sport, between traditionalists who believe in safe dirt tracks and those who say Polytrack and other synthetic surfaces are an ethical imperative.

No long-term data has been compiled on the viability of synthetic tracks.

"The verdict is still out on the Polytrack," Dragone said. "If it shows it's a safer surface in the long run, the industry will make some changes. They just haven't been around long enough. The whole industry is in a wait-and-see mode."

Larry Jones, the trainer of Eight Belles, arrived with his wife, Cindy, at the Churchill Downs backstretch Sunday, still emotional after the loss of his horse. He planned to leave town Monday, vanning his Kentucky Oaks winner Proud Spell back to his base at Delaware Park.

Jones said he was ready to resume racing.

"We've got three in today, and we're going to race them," he said. "You've got to get to business as normal. We're not scratching those other three, afraid to lead them over. It's going to be very depressing for several days around here. We're going to do the work because we have to, not because it's going to be fun to do."