Amoss's 45-day suspension begins Thursday

Tom Amoss, the trainer ranked 32nd in the U.S. by purse earnings in 2015, will begin a 45-day suspension imposed by the Indiana Horse Racing Commission on Thursday, running through the end of October and the two-day Breeders’ Cup event at Keeneland in Lexington, Ky.

The suspension dates to a 2011 positive for the regulated muscle relaxant methocarbomol, but the adjudication of the case was delayed for years as Amoss battled with the racing commission over the significance of the positive finding and a 60-day penalty initially handed down by commissioners. Amoss agreed in July to accept the 45-day suspension as part of a plea agreement that stipulated that the suspension would not begin until mid-September and run through the Breeders’ Cup.

Amoss, a perennial leading trainer at Churchill Downs in Louisville and Fair Grounds in New Orleans, said he plans to spend time with his parents on the coast of Mississippi during the suspension. His father will turn 91 and his mother will turn 90 at the end of this month, he said.

Amoss’s primary clients are Maggi Moss and Midwest Thoroughbreds, two outfits that have horses with trainer Chris Richard. Amoss said he expects many of the horses in his care who are race-ready to be transferred to Richard while he is serving the suspension, though he said that decision would be up to his owners. Richard has won 56 races from 311 starts this year.

Indiana racing regulations prohibit a trainer who is serving a suspension of more than 15 days from transferring horses to family members or assistants.

While methocarbamol is a regulated Class 4 medication with little potential to impact performance, the Indiana commission sought a stiff penalty for the 2011 positive because Amoss had two horses test over the threshold level for the same drug in Kentucky just weeks earlier. Amoss had argued that the commission should be lenient because he had not been notified of the Kentucky positives when the Indiana horse tested positive.