Racing has a serious integrity problem, Jim \u201cMattress Mack\u201d McIngvale believes, and that is why he has pulled the plug and is leaving the game entirely.<\/p>\n
The Blood-Horse was the first to report the story.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe couldn’t compete with all the drugs and all the injections when we were running on just hay, oats and water,\u201d he said. \u201cIt was an uphill battle. Runhappy<\/a> climbed that hill but the rest of them couldn’t. I’m not going to damage my integrity by drugging them and injecting them. I do right by the horses and what was right for the horses didn’t allow us to win anymore. It was time to get out.\u201d<\/p>\n
McIngvale’s horses always ran drug free. He did not even use Lasix.<\/p>\n \u201cAbsolutely, this sport has an integrity problem,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n He includes in that the CAW phenomenon where bettors using computer models are betting huge amounts of money and are allowed to wager at the very last second, which often creates significant changes in the odds after a race starts.<\/p>\n \u201cI’m a big gambler and you can’t gamble on horse racing anymore,\u201d he said. \u201cYou bet and then they let these CAW guys come in. You bet the horse at 4-1 and then it goes off at even-money. I bet a bunch of money the other night when my boy (boxer) Bud Crawford fought Canelo Alvarez. I got it at plus 140 at Caesars. It went up to plus 150. But I got what I got at 140 because of fixed odds and I was happy with that.\u201d<\/p>\n Crawford won the fight.<\/p>\n He also became upset about the dysfunctional nature of the sport and the various fiefdoms refusing to work together.<\/p>\n \u201cHorse racing has 80 million factions all at war with one another and there’s no general direction,\u201d he said. \u201cIn the NFL they all head in the same direction and that’s why it is so successful.\u201d<\/p>\n Runhappy<\/a> (Super Saver), who stood at Claiborne Farm, struggled as a sire but he was still McIngvale’s most valuable racing asset. According to McIngvale, the horse has been sold and will stand next year in South Korea.<\/p>\n McIngvale said that he made a considerable amount of money with Runhappy<\/a>, but lost money overall on the sport.<\/p>\n \u201cI have no idea how much money I’ve lost,\u201d he said. \u201cI had a lot of fun in horse racing and the people were great, but the cheating just beat me down to the point where I had to throw up the white flag.\u00a0 I lost a lot of money, but made a lot of money with Runhappy<\/a>. Obviously, for the whole experience I lost money. But if Runhappy<\/a> had turned out to be the next Storm Cat I would have gotten all my money back. I’ve got a lot of other things going on. I fought it as hard as I could and as long as I could. I got better things to do than fight an uphill battle all the time.\u201d<\/p>\n McIngvale bought Runhappy<\/a> for $200,000 at the 2013 Keeneland September sale. In 2015, the colt won three Grade I races, including the GI Breeders’ Cup Sprint. He also won an Eclipse Award that year as the sport’s top sprinter and was 7-for-10 lifetime and earned $1,496,250. But Runhappy<\/a> could not live up to McIngvale’s expectations as a sire. He’s had eight crops and 556 foals but has produced only four graded stakes winners. His leading runner was Prince of Power, who earned just $183,916.<\/p>\n
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