Etc. . . .

Four jockeys went down in a chain-reaction spill along the backstretch and a fifth rider was hurt in an unrelated incident during Tuesday nights fourth race at Penn National Race Course. Three of the riders Jorge Tipa, Emlio Flores, and Edilberto Rodriguez were taken to the hospital for treatment, and Mothersthirdprize, who began the chain reaction when she broke a coffin bone, was euthanized. . . . Portland Meadows canceled racing Tuesday because of severe winter storm conditions. The track had already canceled racing on Sunday and Monday because riders felt the track surface was uneven, and the weather then hampered efforts to repair the surface in time to run Tuesdays card. Racing is scheduled to resume Sunday. . . . Use of the Jockey Clubs online registration service processed a record 112,420 transactions in 2006, up almost 8 percent from last year, the organization has announced. The service allows owners and breeders to register horses, claim horse names, and submit reports of mares bred and live-foal/no-foal reports electronically. . . . Identical bills that would ban the slaughter of horses for human consumption were introduced into the House of Representatives and the Senate on Wednesday, according to sponsors of the bills. The bills, which aim to shut down the three horse slaughterhouses operating in the United States, are identical to legislation passed by the House late in the 2006 legislative session but never addressed by the Senate before it adjourned for the year.