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| Staff Writer |
On every level racing needs to solve the problem of catastrophic musculoskeletal injuries. Horses dying horrific deaths on the track, jockeys getting injured, paralyzed or even killed are not acceptable events in a 21st century world. The reputation of racing, the track owners, and the sponsors will all be damaged beyond repair should this continue.
To all working towards a solution the underlying problem is very clear. Traditional examinations by veterinarians and trainers cannot see that anything is wrong. This is self-evident as in every case of catastrophic injury, the horse was examined before the race and allowed to run.
However, it is equally true to say that for the most common fractures at least, condylar and sesamoid fractures of the front legs, the underlying pathology responsible for the fracture can be easily detected by using imaging technologies, most particularly a PET scan.
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Unfortunately, without direction veterinarians don’t know which horse and which leg to image and clearly they can’t image them all. And this is where StrideSAFE steps in. StrideSAFE’s algorithms, calculated using data collected from sensors carried by horses during a race, can be used to screen out those few horses at high risk and so direct the veterinarians towards imaging and diagnosis. As some algorithms are now able to flag both the affected limb and the specific fracture types, veterinarians can at last focus on those very few horses at high risk.
Over time as more data is collected then it is possible to envision the day when lesion specific algorithms will be available for all the most common fracture types. Beginning with condylar and sesamoid fractures, this journey has already begun. Everyone in racing can now begin to see light at the end of the tunnel and the day when catastrophic injuries become an extremely rare event.
The idea which became StrideSAFE was conceived in 2019 following a meeting between the owners of 2 companies: StrideMASTER in Australia and Equine Analysis Systems in America. In this company sophisticated sensors built in Australia provide data for equine veterinarians and equine exercise physiologist in America and Sweden to measure events happening at very high speed during a race.
The sensor, measuring 13 cm x 8 cm and weighing only 100g is held in a pocket on the underside of the saddle cloth. Normally neither the horse, the jockey or racing fans are even aware that the sensor is on the horse.
Accelerometers collect data 800 times per second (800Hz) in each of 3 axes, dorso-ventral (up and down), medio-lateral (side to side), and longitudinal (front and back). Sensors coming online in 2025 also have magnetometers (used to measure direction on each axis) and a gyrometer (to measure pitch, yaw, and roll).
In America this sensor has been used on 40,000 runs already and with every horse racing in the state of Kentucky carrying a sensor this number is increasing by thousands every month.
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It is well known by scientists that 80-90% of the time fractures in horses occur through an area of pre-existing pathology. In other words, the pathologies have been ongoing for a period of time (sometimes as long as a year!). This long timeline represents the window of opportunity for racing to detect the pathology and make the diagnosis so the horse can be saved.
Fortunately, although these horses appear sound at the trot, they do nevertheless show signs a sensor can detect once the horse is running at high speed. Racing massively increases the forces acting on the bones and there comes a time when these forces create movement and pain which the horse tries to avoid. At racing speed, the changes are very rapid, 0.01 seconds or faster, and are undetectable to the eye of the trainer or the feel of the jockey. Times like this are easy for sensors to detect however and the masses of data collected lends itself to the creation of predictive algorithms through mathematical modelling and Artificial Intelligence (AI).
StrideSAFE has data on hundreds of runs completed by horses which eventually suffered a catastrophic injury. They are in fact the only company in the world with data like this and as well as data from American racing also have 40,000 race runs from Australia.
StrideSAFE is a company of veterinarians, engineers, and computer scientists who came together simply to see if they could use their know-how and sensors to help racing solve its most pressing problem. Now as racing states like Kentucky provide support, universities with access to the system add to the research and scientific papers begin to be published, it would appear that an entirely new diagnostic modality is about to become available to the veterinary profession. Racing is at last collecting critical data from the bodies of tis athletes and following the lead of all professional human athletic endeavors.
The solution is close at hand and the future is bright.