Gambling is an integral part of horse racing. A good number of owners thrive on gambles. For them, to smash a horse from a higher quote in the betting ring without many people having a clue to the chances of a horse gives greater thrill than winning as a fancied runner.

To avoid coming into the public eye, horses are often worked with a wrong track number to mislead the track reporters about the identity of the horse and thereby the public. There are also other professionals who try to work their horses very early in the morning before track reporters normally troop in hoping that the workout will be missed by them.

The connections that thrive on gambling also use several other means to hide their horse from public gaze but such methods are fraught with danger. In racing, if a horse works brilliantly, it may attract the usual share of punters but if the news spreads that a particular horse had been worked in dark, it is possible such a horse may have a larger following than the one which is worked openly during broad daylight. For the uninitiated, horses are given workouts starting from 5.30 a.m. to 8.30 a.m. in order to get them fit to race. Hidden virtues exert great influence on the mindset of punters and hence have greater relevance than known merit. In race course people give you a damn if you tip a horse based on sound reasoning and logical deduction. If you tag a story along with your selection, the effect is dramatic on the listener however seasoned he may be in racing.

One leading trainer from Mumbai was preparing a horse for a big gamble. As was the practice, he sent the horse early in the morning when the fog cover had not lifted. The track work was not reported. The trainer and the jockey concerned informed the owner that they were on the verge of bringing off a big gamble as the horse they were preparing worked brilliantly. The owner did not see any track work in the newspapers and he was puzzled. He asked the trainer and jockey as to why the work out was not reported if the horse worked so brilliantly. They replied that they worked the horse in dark. The jockey said that the horse went so fast that tears came in his eyes! The horse was worked yet again just a few days prior to the race day in similar fashion and the jockey repeated yet again that he had tears in his eyes. The race day came and expectedly the horse was backed down spiritedly but the horse finished down the field. This time it was the turn of the owner to go and tell the trainer and jockey that their strategy had brought tears in his eyes!

Training a race horse is mostly a trial and error exercise though pedigree and performance of predecessors is a useful guide. One of the senior trainers in the country said that he had a horse which used to run like a champion but would falter nearer the wining post due to noise generated by the crowd. Horses are very sensitive to sound. The trainer thought that packing the ears of the horse could work and it did. Thereafter whenever the horse was out for an airing, the ear packing was removed and when the horse was run with serious intent, the ear plug was put back. This way the said horse won about six races. Use of ear plugs officially is not permitted though in the present day, the blinkers come in such size and shape that a horse which gets distracted can be set right by the use of correct equipment.

A leading trainer was once told to give a run to his horse by his owner when the horse was ready to win. To carry out such owners' wishes, the usual method adopted by trainers is to feed the horse (stuff the horse in racing parlance) before the race. Sometimes tubing (inserting a tube through the mouth and bloating the stomach with water) is also resorted to by some crude trainers. The very devious ones also give insulin in order to bring down the blood sugar of the horse so that it cannot run with its usual zest. Any way, the trainer carried out the owner's command and to his surprise, the horse bolted and won convincingly. This had the trainer thinking. Did the horse run well with a full stomach? He discovered to his surprise that whenever the horse ran on light feed, it ran poorly but when it was fed and sent, it ran brilliantly contrary to the normal behavioral pattern of an athletic horse. The said horse must have been a glutton and must have been tempted to run faster if only because he would be better fed each time he ran well!

On another occasion, one of India’s foremost jockeys was associated in preparing a horse for a touch and was pretty confident that it would bolt in. The owner apparently had a big bet on the horse but to his chagrin, the price on the horse in the ring kept on increasing and went up more than 200 times close to race time. The owner panicked and believed that the horse may have been got at. He took back most of his best at higher odds. Since the owner was taking back his bet at higher odds than the one he had backed, the price shot up like the mercury does during summer! The said horse won like a champion and instead of celebrating the victory of the horse, the owner had to beat a hasty retreat out of racing itself! He had incurred a huge liability which forced him to quit racing.

Horses have a mind of their own and they defeat devious intent if anyone tries to meddle with their natural instinct of running as fast as they can! Because good horses always do their job!