Information Collection Key in Maintaining Track Surfaces

Presenters discussed how improved information collection is helping to improve racetrack surfaces throughout the United States.
Share
Favorite
Close

No account yet? Register

ADVERTISEMENT

A pair of presenters on racetrack surfaces at the Welfare and Safety of the Racehorse Summit talked about how improved information collection is helping to improve surfaces throughout the United States during a session July 9 at Keeneland Race Course in Lexington, Kentucky.

Mick Peterson, MS, PhD, executive director of the Racing Surfaces Testing Laboratory, said better record-keeping of track maintenance is improving track safety and consistency, especially with dirt surfaces. With major tracks like Del Mar, in California, and Keeneland planning to switch their main tracks from synthetic to dirt surfaces next year, such information will be especially important.

"The best dirt is not as good as synthetic, but it's close," Peterson said of the safety records of the two surfaces. "If we look year to year, the good dirt tracks are almost as good as the synthetics."

Peterson noted that his lab is not able to give tracks a magic bullet on dirt surface make-up because each track's need varies by region and weather. Even once a track has a top mix for its dirt surface, maintaining that track is paramount. Peterson said the biggest factor in maintenance of dirt and turf surfaces is water content

Create a free account with TheHorse.com to view this content.

TheHorse.com is home to thousands of free articles about horse health care. In order to access some of our exclusive free content, you must be signed into TheHorse.com.

Start your free account today!

Already have an account?
and continue reading.

Share

Written by:

Frank Angst is a staff writer for The Blood-Horse magazine. An American Horse Publications three-time winner in best news story category, Angst has covered horse racing for more than a decade. Angst spent ten years at Thoroughbred Times, where he earned awards as that magazine’s senior writer and helped launch Thoroughbred Times TODAY. Besides covering horse racing, Angst enjoys handicapping. Angst has written about sports for more than 20 years, including several seasons covering a nationally ranked Marshall Thundering Herd football team.

Related Articles

Stay on top of the most recent Horse Health news with

FREE weekly newsletters from TheHorse.com

Sponsored Content

Weekly Poll

sponsored by:

How much time do you usually spend grooming your horse?
439 votes · 439 answers

Readers’ Most Popular

Sign In

Don’t have an account? Register for a FREE account here.

Need to update your account?

You need to be logged in to fill out this form

Create a free account with TheHorse.com!