A NEW documentary, Respiratory Complication: It’s in the Blood, which was commissioned by Irish company StableLab, has illustrated incontrovertibly that pre-race blood testing to measure the Serum Amyloid A biomarker is not just beneficial but is in fact a vital tool, along with the innate horse sense of a trainer, in determining a horse’s readiness to perform.

While the practice is more common in Europe and Australia, with legendary trainers Jim Bolger and Martin Pipe showing the benefits of using the revolutionary StableLab test time and again, American handlers have yet to be convinced about its merit.

The chief concern centres on the perceived wasted expense of using the technology (approximately $65 per test), with most trainers backing their lifetimes of knowledge and experience around horses to spot if their charges are not in top shape from their track work, how they look or are eating.

Graham Motion could be the man to spark a change of attitudes however.

The celebrated trainer, who has won a multitude of Grade 1 prizes including the Kentucky Derby and three Breeders’ Cup contests, participated in an experiment for the documentary, which has shown that pre-testing can act as a very useful complement to the horse knowledge of an expert conditioner.

Dr Luis Castro is one of the leading American equine veterinarians and he took part in a screening process in one of Motion’s barns at Palm Meadows training centre for the purposes of the aforementioned documentary, taking blood samples from 12 horses.

One of those tested had run below par two days previously, finishing tailed off despite travelling well for most of the race and been primed by the trainer to perform at his peak.

The run suggested that something was amiss but a post-race scope was clear and the horse looked a picture of health.

There were no orthopaedic physical signs of any ailment and not even a horseman of Motion’s calibre spotted that anything was amiss.

The disappointment of the run was the only evidence of something being wrong but without knowing what, no treatment could be prescribed.

It was for this reason that Dr Castro selected the horse to be screened with the StableLab test and the result was an alarming SAA read of 1104, confirming a severe infection despite the horse having scoped cleanly.

Another test taken the following day produced a count of 783.

Although this represented a reduction, Dr Castro recognised that abscessation of the lungs could be responsible.

As a result he ordered an ultrasound which revealed numerous abscesses that might have been worsened by racing.

Dr Castro states categorically that the infection would not have been found without the deployment of the StableLab test. Nobody would have been any wiser as to why the horse had run poorly.

They key point from the findings though is that the bad run, subsequent reduction in the horse’s rating and exacerbation of the infection could have been avoided with a pre-race test.

StableLab was founded by Sligo man Heinrich Anhold who this week was honoured by the ITBA Western Region.