Born to run.
That’s what anyone working with thoroughbreds will tell you about their horses, including chuckwagon racers.
Calgary Stampede infield barns were brimming with thoroughbreds from July 3-12, auditioning for space on the groomed GMC Rangeland Derby surface. But the optics, and the reality, of the 2015 Calgary show are salient; four injured horses euthanized over 10 nights of chuckwagon racing. Thirty-six teams, bringing more than 500 thoroughbreds, entered Stampede’s Rangeland Derby.
In his eighth season racing wagons, Cremona’s Jordie Fike, now racing out of High River, speaks insightfully when asked about wagon-racing risks. He brought 16 thoroughbreds to Stampede, harnessing varying four-horse teams to his 1,350-pound wagon depending on which barrel he’d draw each race night.
“There’s nothing else you can really do with them,” he says of thoroughbreds’ desire to run. “I’ve had the odd, old outriding horse you want to go for an enjoyable ride on. It just doesn’t work.
“That’s (run) all they want to do. I have a horse, that if you don’t harness him that night, you have to stay away from him because he’s mad and he’ll get you. When you harness him, he’s good. If he’s not getting harnessed that night, just stay away from him because he’s pissed-off at you. He knows what’s going on.”
Younger-brother Chad Fike is in his second season of wagon racing, and appearing in his first Stampede GMC Rangeland Derby. He insists the welfare of the animals competing on the Half Mile of Hell, as the World Professional Chuckwagon Racing circuit is known, is every competitor’s first order of business.
“It was unfortunate what happened,” Chad Fike remarks of the chuckwagon horse euthanizing at Stampede.
“No one likes to see that at all.”
But he is equally insistent chuckwagon thoroughbreds are doing what they want to be doing. The majority of chuckwagon horses are ex-thoroughbred race horses whose careers end by age 6. Destined for the slaughterhouse, they are purchased at auction by chuckwagon racers and can end up pulling rigs competitively as far as age 21.
“This is what they’re bred for. They’ve been bred for years to run and a lot of them aren’t good for much else than racing on the race track,” Chad Fike says. “They want to continue on doing what they love.
“That’s their life. They wouldn’t be happy kicked out in the field and foundering on grass. A lot of people just don’t keep them. The alternative is fairly grim for these horses if they don’t come to chuckwagons.”
There is a certain level of risk to chuckwagon racing. But that risk is mitigated by the skill of the drivers and the fitness of the teams. Horses are examined prior to racing to determine physical fitness for competition.
“There is always the realm of factors you can’t control when you’re dealing with horses,” Chad Fike explains. “For the most part, the amount of times we go around that race track, both as an outrider and as a driver, it’s quite safe, actually.”
Consider the alternative.
“I feel a lot safer sitting in the chuckwagon than I do driving down the Deerfoot at rush hour. Honest.”
Following the conclusion of the 2015 show, Stampede officials pledged to conduct a review of animal safety.
