Hoping no horses die this year in the Grand national.

[cheekee]

According to Keith, these whips don't really do any harm to the horses. It's like a tap to them (have you seen the stable girls/boys who taps the horses after the races? It's the same thing). And the jockeys are only allowed 8 times I think to whip the horse at the race. There are counters for that and jockeys are punished if they exceed the number of whips allowed. They are banned for racing for a number of days or a week I think (and these jockeys usually races a number of times everyday). And most jockeys don't do any harm to these horses. When a horse fall down on hurdles in the race, you can see the jockeys staying beside the horse until he/she is sure the horse is fine (like what Ruby Walsh did on Thursday with Arctic Fire and today with Balthazar King). I remember when Synchronised died, AP McCoy was so upset that he didn't race for a few days.

I don't confess to have as much experience of watching races as you but the ones I did the jockeys seems to be hitting the horses very hard with the whips. I didn't realise there was rules regarding the whips. Thank you for telling me that. Would be interesting to see how races would progress though if whips were not used. Just a thought really. I have seen the stable boys/girls do what you say. Thats like a gentle "Pat on the skin" which I believed was different to being hit with a whip. Animals in the wild don't express signs of pain because that would be seen as weak and they would be easy prey for predators. I have seen many injured animals that don't show any signs of pain.

[Tawi2]

I have seen many injured animals that don't show any signs of pain.

Maybe they are in shock,badly injured creatures start to shut-down,I cant remember the name of the naturally occuring chemical but there is one,that calms herbivores such as zebra when they are being eaten alive by a pride of lions (nature is far crueller than man),a sort of natural pain-killer.

[cheekee]

The fight or flight mechanism using adrenaline/cortisol ?

The animals I am talking about were not fatally injured.

[Ako Si Jamie]

Maybe they are in shock,badly injured creatures start to shut-down,I cant remember the name of the naturally occuring chemical but there is one,that calms herbivores such as zebra when they are being eaten alive by a pride of lions (nature is far crueller than man),a sort of natural pain-killer.

I remember seeing a bird being eaten alive by a predator on YT but it wasn't fighting for it's life. It just lay there calm as a cucumber and didn't look in pain at all.

[cheekee]

I remember seeing a bird being eaten alive by a predator on YT but it wasn't fighting for it's life. It just lay there calm as a cucumber and didn't look in pain at all.

Yes probably shocked with all the chemicals just talked about flowing.