THE FUTURE of jumps racing is in severe jeopardy after a third horse, Clearview Bay, had to be put down at this year's Warrnambool, Vic, horse racing meeting carnival.
This horse death makes the fifth this year in the jumps racing season.
Top weight Clearview Bay broke its neck with about 1000m left and was immediately put down in today's feature race, the 5500m Grand Annual Steeple.
Its jockey, Tommy Logan, suffered a suspected fractured broken collarbone and was taken to Warrnambool Base Hospital.
In the first race today, eight-year-old gelding Hassle broke a sesamoid bone in the leg during the 3200m opening race and was later put down.
The accident happened on the back straight, close to the 600m mark, but it is believed the injury was not the result of jumping a hurdle.
Hassle's trainer Robbie Laing confirmed the gelding sustained a serious injury to his sesamoid bone.
"It definitely happened on the flat," Laing told racenet.com.au.
"His sesamoid just shattered and they would have had no option but to put him down."
Hassle, ridden by Brad McLean, appeared to blunder after the second last hurdle in the 3200m event.
McLean said the horse got over the jump well.
"But three or four strides later I felt his leg go and I pulled him up straight away," he said.
The fight to save jumps racing in Victoria had already suffered a serious blow when a stayer Pride of Westbury, crashed and broke its neck in front of the grandstand at the Warrnambool races yesterday.
Today's gruelling 5500-metre Grand Annual Steeplechase will face scrutiny like never before in its 137-year history.
The president of Victorian Advocates for Animals, Lawrence Pope, said it was time for Racing Minister Rob Hulls to act.
"The minister has said that he has put the jumps racing industry on notice.
"It's time that he served that notice now without delay," Mr Pope said.
"Racing Victoria is like a drunken man who believes that just a few more drinks will sober him up.
"They continue to ask for another season, and another season but there will be no end to the deaths and there'll be no end to the traumatising of the public.
"We won't stop in our campaign to have it ended."
Mr Pope said he had heard Hassle had gone down during the race and a screen had gone up around the horse.
"That's never a good sign and death is never far away in this branch of racing," he said.
Mr Pope said Racing Victoria chief executive Rob Hines should apologise for yesterday, when he blamed Pride of Westbury for its own death.
Mr Hines said the six-year-old stayer had made a mistake at the final hurdle.
"They take a horse out, they run it at full speed, they put an obstacle in front of it and then the horse falls and dies and it's the horse's fault.
"It's breathtaking," Mr Pope said.
Mr Pope said Racing Victoria was playing a "dangerous political game" by forcing the minister's hand rather than acting on jumps racing, which was banned in NSW in 1997.
Hassle's death comes ahead of this afternoon's Grand Annual Steeplechase, the premier race of the Warrnambool club's three-day May carnival, which is due to run just before 3pm.
Victorian Advocates for Animals is working with other animal welfare organisation to have jumps racing ban and has asked for a meeting with Mr Hull's office.
Coalition for the Protection of Racehorses said protesters were demonstrating outside the Warrnambool racecourse after Pride of Westbury's death yesterday.
Coalition spokesman Ward Young said protesters would gather at Treasury Place tomorrow to demand Mr Hulls ban jumps racing.
Jumps jockey Trent Wells, who was riding Pride of Westbury in the 3200-metre Galleywood Hurdle, returned to the Warrnambool track today nursing a broken right wrist.
The 23-year-old said Pride of Westbury had been tiring and crashed into the jump and "didn't put the landing gear on".
The injury continues a run of bad luck for Wells, who suffered a broken right collarbone and left thumb last season.
Wells said he had to consult a medical specialist next week and he did not know how long his wrist injury would keep him from riding.
- with Warrnambool Standard.
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