Gulfstream Park: Injury ends Arson Squad’s career

Barbara D. Livingston

Arson Squad suffered career-ending injuries during a Saturday workout at Gulfstream Park.

Trainer Rick Dutrow Jr. happily reported that the injuries his multiple Grade 2 winner Arson Squad suffered when breaking down just before completing a workout here Saturday do not appear to be life-threatening, although his racing career is over.

Arson Squad, 9, retires with 9 wins in 35 career starts and earnings of nearly $1.2 million. Owned by the Jay Em Ess Stable, Arson Squad made his final start on Dec. 10 at Aqueduct, finishing third in the Queens County Stakes. Arson Squad joined Dutrow’s barn during summer 2008 and promptly won the Grade 2 Meadowlands Cup. He’s also a graded stakes winner locally, accounting for the Grade 3 Skip Away in April 2010.

“He might have to undergo surgery, but Dr. [Larry] Bramlage said he should be okay,” Dutrow said. “He was such a special horse to be around, and one of our best friends here at the barn. But out on the track, he was all race horse and the kind you want to have bedded down in your barn. Now, he gets to retire and just hang out the right way the rest of his life.”

Dutrow said he got Arson Squad after the California tracks installed synthetic surfaces in 2008.

“He just couldn’t do the Polytrack thing, that’s why they sent him back east to me,” Dutrow said. “The Meadowlands Cup was the first race we ran him and probably his best race, but he also ran big for us at Churchill Downs and several other places, including here at Gulfstream.”

Arson Squad was one of four horses who broke down either during or immediately after completing workouts here Saturday. He was the only one of that group to survive.

“It definitely wasn’t the racetrack that was responsible for what happened here on Saturday,” Dutrow said. “It was just one of those freak mornings that come along every 100 years.”

Dutrow reported that Redeemed, who worked six furlongs here in an easy 1:15.20 on Monday, and Harlan’s Holiday winner Trickmeister remain on target for the Grade 1 Donn Handicap on Feb. 11.

“Redeemed is fit and ready to run,” Dutrow said. “Trickmeister came out of his last race well and so far all’s good with him, too.”

Dutrow also sent out All Due Respect to work a bullet five furlongs in 59.40 seconds here on a chilly Tuesday morning in preparation for an expected defense of her title in Saturday’s $60,000 Ocala.