Breeding Drain or Racing Gain: What happens when an import's racing career is over?

Cover image courtesy of Team Thoroughbred NSW

Aftercare continues to be a hot topic of conversation, and it is fair to think that imported horses might have an impact. In an era of economic downturn and extreme weather events, it is a poor time to be wanting to rehome extra horses. With the majority of imports being geldings, where do they fit into the story?

Head of Education at The Australian Veterinary Association Dr Meredith Flash led research published in 2021 that analysed the destinations of 2509 horses coming off the track in the 2017/18 season, and ascertained that 30 per cent went into thoroughbred breeding, 45 per cent went on to equestrian pursuits, and 8.4 per cent found companion homes.

In a companion article in 2022, Flash et al determined the median age of retirement was five.

Based on the prizemoney numbers reported in Part 2 of the series, European imports have contributed $1.396 million to welfare in the 2024/25 season (with current contribution at 2 per cent of prizemoney).

If the 631 horses that arrived from Europe in the 2023/24 can act as a guide, this breaks down to $2212 per horse. The equine welfare fund covers more than just post-racing aftercare, so is this contribution enough?

The rising costs

Wagga Wagga-based retrainer Carisa Oakley knows better than most about the financial pressure facing retainers and rehomers of thoroughbreds; earlier this year, TTR AusNZ spoke to Oakley about Racing NSW’s refusal to extend their euthanasia assistance program to her thoroughbred because he hadn’t had enough starts in the state, and it was a significant turning point for Oakley. She has downsized her retraining population substantially, and only takes on paying clients.

“If the horse is just spelling in the paddock, you’re looking at a roundbale of hay every two to three weeks (per horse),” Oakley said. There is a winter drought where Oakley is based and throughout much of the south of Australia, with little feed on the ground to keep feed prices down.

“They used to be $120, but they’ve gone up to $200 now. I usually give some kind of hard feed, which averages $40 a bag for a complete feed, and you might get 20 feeds out of that if you’re lucky, so that’s a couple more dollars a day.”

During the early stages of the Rosehill inquiry in October of last year, Racing NSW divulged some figures about Team Thoroughbred’s aftercare, and was, at the time, caring for 581 retired racehorses across six properties, with 321 at Bandanora in the central west. The feed bill for Racing NSW’s program was reported to be $790,000 per annum; this puts out an estimate of $1360 spend on feed per horse, or $27.20 a week, not including production costs for Racing NSW’s two lucerne farms.

Bringing a horse into work increases the expense; feed increases, roundbales are replaced with more expensive per kilo square bales, and Oakley is in an area where she has little choice but to put shoes on a horse she wants to take out.

“I find, for most of them, you can't just take their shoes off and let them go,” she said. “You usually have to put at least fronts back on, and so that is about $130 here, $170 for a full set.”

Normal equine care is still required, and Oakley finds most thoroughbreds will need a full veterinary dental at the beginning of their retraining before they can get started; this can set an owner back around $200, depending on the vet and the level of sedation.

“Also a huge proportion will need to go on to some type of ulcer treatment,” she said. “I prefer to treat with the veterinary one, rather than waste money on supplements that may or may not work, especially if I strongly suspect that they've got them. So a course of that is about $600. You need to get at least $1500 for them straight away to recoup costs, and that’s not even factoring in training or outings.”

This doesn’t factor in the cost of agistment either; Oakley owns her property, but many equestrian owners agist, with prices varying drastically depending on the facilities and level of care. An owner in Sydney may pay in excess of $250 a week for full board at a facility with an arena, whereas that may drop to half the price in more rural areas.

The price of exposure

Oakley estimated that all inclusive training costs can range from $125 to $450 a week - depending on how much the rider is getting paid, and how often the horses are ridden - and that only just factors in property care. Oakley has been sewing oats in her paddocks in an attempt to increase nutritional intake without spending more on feed.

Exposure through outings are additional on top; an educational showjumping round can cost between $10 and $45 depending on the club (plus annual membership for the rider), and clinics across various disciplines start over $100 per horse, and that is all before factoring in fuel and potentially stabling for longer events.

Competitors at last year’s Equimillion event would have spent $1000 on entry fees (often paid by a sponsor), with stabling on the Sydney International Equestrian Centre complex costing $40 a day (plus $80 for bedding), with an additional $45 per night for camping onsite.

While Equimillion offered exceptional prizemoney ($30,000 total for a class, guaranteeing $1500 for sixth place), smaller events offer a lot less to none at all. A start in the lowest level at last year’s Sydney International 3-Day Event would set you back $250 in entry fees, plus a minimum $220 in stabling and camping (for one night), and a medical levy of $45. First prize was $250.

“The market can be quite hard, because they can be very cheap or free straight off the track, and you need to prove that you have something that’s better than what people think they are getting for cheaper,” Oakley said. “Because they aren’t factoring in the dental work, the ulcer treatment, the feeding.”

The last cost for Oakley is time; she admitted she prefers to take her time with off the track thoroughbreds, and it may be six to 12 months before she is happy to send them to a new home. Racing Victoria’s RESET program anticipates 12 to 16 weeks of retraining is required before horses are suitable for rehoming.

Some horses may be able to go to an experienced home quicker - but those experienced homes are not common, and Oakley finds herself dealing with a vast amount of people who want the thoroughbred because it appears, on base level, cheaper than another breed.

“It's pretty hard (to judge how much time they will need), how many race starts they had can be a guide. Obviously, if they only had one trial or something like that, they may not need very long at all, but if they've come in from a pretty decent prep, they're a bit different. I really like to make sure that they've ticked every box or they end up staying.

“Unfortunately, they cater to the kind of people who don’t want to spend any money on a trained horse - but thoroughbreds are the worst horses to get if you don’t want to spend any money, because you will have to spend money, even if it's not in the initial purchase price.”

In Oakley’s experience, barring injury, European imports tend to find homes quicker than domestic-bred horses. They often offer something that the domestic speed horse could be lacking.

“Eventing-wise, stayers are what I advise people to look for,” Oakley said. “They’re more athletic looking, and they’re normally more level headed as they have to settle more in their races. There’s some Irish lines that are known for being calmer.”

The burden of injury

But when there’s a squeeze in the market - as Oakley has witnessed over the last two years - there will always be horses that struggle to sell. The first on that list is anything with a past injury, particularly to the tendons.

“If they’ve done a tendon at some point, I can’t get people to buy them,” she said. “No one wants to touch them. With the treatments and care regimes we have for tendons these days, it’s unlikely they’ll injure it again, but no one wants them.

"It’s not like they’re likely to go to the top of another sport - if they are, the horse will be going to the professionals, and those kinds of people are not paying $5000 for one off the track that has had a little bit of work done with it.”

The tide has really turned this year, from what Oakley has seen.

“We come from that big boom where horses were selling for really good money, feed was everywhere, and now we're coming into a bit of a drought and there's always lots of horses looking for homes, people are going to be a bit more fussy. You're going to start ruling out the windsuckers, the tendon injuries, the ones that are just a bit ugly comformationally. People feel like, ‘oh, well, why would I pay for that? I can wait and buy the next one’.”

A survey on thoroughbreds born in Victoria in 2010 indicated that 59 per cent of horses retired voluntarily from racing, whereas 29 per cent retired due to injury. Extrapolated out to the estimated retiring population nationwide, 1776 horses retire every year from injury, and all will require some kind of rehabilitation if there is a chance of an equestrian future.

Racing Victoria and Racing NSW both have permanent retirement farms and the former has a companion program to try to support some of this number, but there will always be a pressure to minimise those numbers. A horse that cannot make itself "useful" under saddle or in another role will always struggle to find a home, because having a horse in the paddock doing nothing still costs money.

Rehabilitation after a tendon injury varies widely; a bowed tendon kept three-time Group 1 winner Think It Over (So You Think {NZ}) sidelined for over a year. Most horses require at least three months rest before rehabilitation work can begin in earnest, if they can be brought back to riding soundness at all.

That is a factor worth considering; in a market where the costs of feed are skyrocketing, who wants to invest in a horse they will have to wait even longer to get started with?

Hong Kong’s solution

Hong Kong offers an answer for when horses return to Australia after racing. The Hong Kong Jockey Club’s Executive Manager Equestrian Affairs Projects Natasha Rose outlined the Club’s commitment to aftercare for horses coming to Hong Kong; the HK$100,000 ($19,400) import fee on all horses arriving in the jurisdiction is the financial driver behind the Hong Kong RESTART program that retrains and rehomes horses owned by the Club.

If an owner wishes to take their horse out of the country to retire, that fee is refunded to be put towards travel costs.

“Currently, just under HK$139 million ($2.7 million) is invested by the Club into the Restart programme on an annual basis,” Rose told The Thoroughbred Report via email. Split between Hong Kong and Conghua, there is the capacity for 182 horses to undergo retraining, and many of them stay within the jurisdiction as riding school and pleasure horses.

Some do get sent to Australia - and to several other countries, with Hong Kong Jockey Club-supported rehomers also in England, France, and New Zealand - where the Club continues to pay for their retraining until they can find a home.

“The Club has official partnerships with Racing Victoria and Racing South Australia, and an informal arrangement with Racing Australia, to ensure Hong Kong horses can be tracked through their retirement,” Rose said.

Some syndicators like OTI Racing take similar responsibility; OTI has a $2000 levy on all racehorses sold which goes towards assisting former OTI horses in their next career, and keeps track of OTI horses with biannual updates on their progress.

Where do they fit?

Not all welfare programs are made equal. A harsh light has been shone on Racing NSW’s program in this publication before, and it bears mentioning that the principle racing authority has more than once denied care due to a horse not having been “predominantly domiciled” in the state - yet there is no definition to be found for exactly what that means.

This is a problem that imports immediately face when retiring from racing. How many starts in the state qualify them for care? What if they race predominantly in another state, but exit the industry within New South Wales? If an import is ineligible for care from Racing NSW, but cannot be reached by another PRA’s welfare team, whose responsibility is its care?

Both the Hong Kong Jockey Club and OTI's programs raise the idea of a separate levy on imports to help assist in their care post-racing, particularly since most from the Northern Hemisphere will race overseas before entering Australia and therefore make no contribution to welfare in the early years of their career.

Crucially, they also make no contribution to the economy at all prior to their arrival, and will continue to live as long as the local-breds after their career on the track finishes.

While all thoroughbreds in the country deserve to benefit from our welfare schemes, how do we ensure that imports contribute as much as the local population?