With the doping levels used today, will there ever be another Triple Crown Winner?

I’ll Have Another won’t have another. After so brilliantly winning the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness Stakes, the horse has been scratched from the Belmont Stakes due to tendonitis in the left front leg, ending hopes he might win the Triple Crown of US Thoroughbred Racing. Such an injury may well be the end of the colt’s racing career. Of course, from the horse’s viewpoint, that may not be so bad. Retirement for a winning race horse means hanging out in lush green pastures with pretty fillies from fine lineages, and fathering lots of colts in hopes of breeding the next generation champion.

There have been 11 winners of the US Triple Crown of Thoroughbred Racing, the last being Affirmed in 1978. Triple Crowns used to occur rather regularly, with back to back wins in 1977 by Seattle Slew and 1978 with Affirmed. The famous Secretariat had won in 1973. There were 11 winners from 1919 to 1978, a space of just 59 years. So on average, there was a Triple Crown winner every 5.36 years.

But since that Affirmed’s win 34 years ago, the use of performance enhancing drugs in thoroughbred racing has become routine. Are we pushing the animals so far today that no body of flesh and bone can withstand the demands? Should the use of steroids and performance enhancing drugs by outlawed in horse racing just as it has been in human sporting competitions?