Derby Preps/Bone Remodeling

Pamplemoose's eyepopper reminded me, were somebody asks Jack Van Berg in his video, how we know if we have a good horse. Van Berg, eyebrow raised at the (dumb) question, "Well, if 20 horses are running and one of them is way out in front, you've got a very good horse or 19 others that can't run a jump." T.P looks like a good one, with some stride and action worries, though. Can we take it that Canani's primarily short (in distance) breezing program produced this result? I'm thinking there has to be more to the training than what shows, and that it would be nice to be informed of the whole program including the slow days. Will Canani now keep up the work, or back off as Dutrow last year. Should be interesting to dicey with this particular horse. Great story building, possibly.

And, nice race in the Fountain of Youth, but do little things tell for future prospects? Quality Road crosses the wire with the jock failing to change leads on the gallop out AND seeming for the distance of the clubhouse turn totally oblivious to the necessity. Result: Q.R. finishes his charge down the stretch with another 2+f on the same lead. Reminds of 2008 and lack of attention to detail by trainers B. Tagg and Eion Harty, good horses, sloppy work here and there. If Jerkins was cussing the jock post race for the oversight that would bode well for the horse. Otherwise, for me, avoid this bandwagon.

And, drumroll, it is now back to bones:

The 2/19 post summarized what happens within the cannon bone at the molecular level during the breeze/race. After the race, back at the barn, as we're confronting the flashing cannon bone heat and pondering the "what next" question, we transfer our concern to what happens with the bone remodeling process itself and how to get to point "X" RAFR (Race appropriate fracture resistance), and how to stay there with that process.

First question that occurs, is equine race horse remodeling similar to the above human illustrations showing remodeling primarily confined to osteoclast/blast destruction/reconstruction over time in response to events? So, is our horse post breeze/race remodeling process thus also limited to the osteoclast cells chewing away damaged bone cells here and there and the osteoblasts then coming in and building over time--probably 60 days--or is there something more to remodeling in horses compared to humans?

I came to a screeching halt in my analysis because the answer or even a way to analyze this is/was frankly unknown to me, nor was I able to find a quick answer at the Google. The horse papers mostly refer to remodeling as a process that just happens--a sort of mysterious event that we rely on as we go through training. Human papers concerned primarily with osteoporosis or fracture repair also provided little help, although finally I returned to Hansma's website and found some help.

And so, in fairly brief, and hopefully succinct terms over the next few posts, I'll post my thoughts on this and note that, yes,there's probably a lot more to race horse bone remodelling than what takes place in the human skeleton.

Training:
Fri. 2/27 to Sun. 3/1. Deep winter returns with 5 inches of snow. Both horses off Fri and sat. Sun. the snow was perfect for a riderless paddock run conducted to protect Art who's just coming back from his hoof problem-- turned out to be 2 miles total 4 x 4f with a minute rest between at 80-85% speed.