Chad Summers Joins the TDN Writers’ Room

Anyways, well, welcome to another edition of the show, and boy, it, it's hard to get through a couple months without talking about Paco Lopez.

Now, we brought up in the previous edition of the TDN Writer's Room there was a spill at Saratoga on July 3rd, but that seemed to be all the news at that point.

Lo and behold, last week the Saratoga stewards to the New York State Gaming Commission handed Mr. Lopez a 30-day suspension for his ride aboard the horse I Love Giraffes.

We have to start with our jockey, Zoe Cadman.

What about Paco? Did he deserve that suspension?

It's hard to tell.

Honestly, I've watched the drone shot over and over and over, and there are some people saying that Junior came out and he started it.

The simple fact of the matter is if you are a jockey and you are on the outside of the field, there is no necessity to be quite that close.

Your job is to relieve pressure to the inside of horses.

Any time there's a spill or somebody clips h- horses, they automatically look to the outside horse to see if the outside horse is crowding the horses down on the inside.

Now, horses are gonna shift in, uh, on the turn anyway.

It's kind of a natural progression, especially when they, they switch leads.

Whether they're going left, they'll s- switch in.

Whether they're going right, they'll switch out.

But as a jockey, your job is to maintain a straight course, and there was no reason for him to be quite that close.

He wasn't holding anyone in.

He was just dangling the reins like he does.

And yes, he warms horses up very well and, you know, there's that old adage that you never see horses clip heels in a field when they're all galloping around in a pack, and they don't.

But Paco does a great job of warming the horses up.

They kind of get used to the feel of him and realize that even though he doesn't have a hold of their mouths, he kind of guides them that way.

So this horse is trusting in Paco at this point.

He clipped heels.

It's Paco.

They're gonna come down on Paco, and history just repeats itself with Paco.

Let us not forget, it was not even two years ago he smacked that horse around the head.

Anyways, well, welcome to another edition of the show, and boy, it, it's hard to get through a couple months without talking about Paco Lopez.

Now, we brought up in the previous edition of the TDN Writer's Room there was a spill at Saratoga on July 3rd, but that seemed to be all the news at that point.

Lo and behold, last week the Saratoga stewards to the New York State Gaming Commission handed Mr. Lopez a 30-day suspension for his ride aboard the horse I Love Giraffes.

We have to start with our jockey, Zoe Cadman.

What about Paco? Did he deserve that suspension?

It's hard to tell.

Honestly, I've watched the drone shot over and over and over, and there are some people saying that Junior came out and he started it.

The simple fact of the matter is if you are a jockey and you are on the outside of the field, there is no necessity to be quite that close.

Your job is to relieve pressure to the inside of horses.

Any time there's a spill or somebody clips h- horses, they automatically look to the outside horse to see if the outside horse is crowding the horses down on the inside.

Now, horses are gonna shift in, uh, on the turn anyway.

It's kind of a natural progression, especially when they, they switch leads.

Whether they're going left, they'll s- switch in.

Whether they're going right, they'll switch out.

But as a jockey, your job is to maintain a straight course, and there was no reason for him to be quite that close.

He wasn't holding anyone in.

He was just dangling the reins like he does.

And yes, he warms horses up very well and, you know, there's that old adage that you never see horses clip heels in a field when they're all galloping around in a pack, and they don't.

But Paco does a great job of warming the horses up.

They kind of get used to the feel of him and realize that even though he doesn't have a hold of their mouths, he kind of guides them that way.

So this horse is trusting in Paco at this point.

He clipped heels.

It's Paco.

They're gonna come down on Paco, and history just repeats itself with Paco.

Let us not forget, it was not even two years ago he smacked that horse around the head.