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Close out to continue form at Motukarara
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Copy That sets hearts fluttering
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Copy That sets hearts fluttering
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Barclay and Ellis start strong team at Winton
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Barclay and Ellis start strong team at Winton
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Belle is the queen of Alex Park
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Belle is the queen of Alex Park
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All Stars dominate on Inter Dominion Final night
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All Stars dominate on Inter Dominion Final night
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The Shark – Best at Akaroa Sunday
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The Shark – Best at Akaroa Sunday
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The Shark – Best At Winton Sunday
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The Shark – Best At Winton Sunday
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Local takes out Waikato Cup
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Randwick winner a tonic for Clarke family
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Julius strikes in feature sprint
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Another milestone for trainer Tony Gollan
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Autumn could be the right fit for Seasons
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Huge storm washes out Doomben meeting
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Thompson gets first win since Vic return
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Announcements
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By Wandering Eyes · Posted
Derek Leung Ka-chun is hoping to be the comeback king at Happy Valley on Wednesday with his sights firmly set on overhauling Matthew Poon Ming-fai in the Tony Cruz Award race. Sitting on 34 winners for the campaign, the 36-year-old is two behind Poon in the local riders’ premiership heading into the final meeting of the season, with fellow hopeful Matthew Chadwick sandwiched between them on 35 in what is set to be a photo finish. Leung entered Sha Tin on Sunday down three to Poon, but with the...View the full article -
By Wandering Eyes · Posted
Tom Lacy, a former jockey, trainer, and the breeder of 2022 July Stakes winner (G2) and young Tally-Ho Stud sire Persian Force, has died at the age of 89, following a brief illness.View the full article -
By Wandering Eyes · Posted
On the July 14 episode of BloodHorse Monday, Aron Wellman discusses Journalism's entry in the Haskell Stakes (G1), track announcer Matt Dinerman talks about calling the race, and Patrick Brown previews The Racing and Gaming Conference at Saratoga.View the full article -
By Wandering Eyes · Posted
After a dominant gate-to-wire win in the Delaware Oaks (G3) last month, Eclipse Thoroughbred Partners' president and founder Aron Wellman told the BloodHorse Monday podcast that Fondly is targeting the Monmouth Oaks (G3) at Monmouth Park July 26.View the full article -
By Wandering Eyes · Posted
The arbitrator in charge of trainer Phil Serpe's contested clenbuterol positive detected in a filly who won last summer at Saratoga Race Course has issued a final decision that metes out the exact penalties sought by the Horseracing Integrity and Welfare Unit (HIWU)–a two-year suspension, plus a race disqualification and forfeiture of purse winnings. Beyond the potentially career-ending banishment of the 66-year-old trainer, what was striking about the decision is that it did not impose any monetary fine upon Serpe. According to ADMC Rule 3223, Serpe could have faced a fine of up to $25,000 as part of his sanctions. Such a fine against Serpe was initially sought by HIWU after the drug was detected in the urine of Fast Kimmie (Oscar Performance) after her Aug. 10, 2024 victory. But on Apr. 23, 2025–eight months after the date of the violation and six months after Serpe initiated a federal lawsuit against HISA and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC)–HIWU took the unusual step of informing Serpe via a one-paragraph letter that it would not be seeking any fine at his arbitration hearing. That's a departure from how the agency handled a dozen other clenbuterol detections since the ADMC went into effect in May 2023. Serpe's legal team has argued in a Florida federal court that HIWU's sudden non-pursuit of the $25,000 penalty is an alleged end-around to stymie Serpe's efforts to prove in his Oct. 17, 2024 lawsuit that he has been wrongfully denied his Seventh Amendment right to a jury trial. HISA had asserted in an Apr. 24, 2025 court document that HIWU's lack of a monetary fine in Serpe's case “moots Plaintiff's Seventh Amendment claim and removes any risk of cognizable harm with respect to it,” and that the judge in the case “should dispose of Plaintiff's Seventh Amendment claim, and Plaintiff's motion for a preliminary injunction relating to that claim.” Serpe's civil complaint cites a United States Supreme Court case that previously ruled that a federal regulatory agency's enforcement for civil monetary penalties must be brought in a federal court, subject to the Seventh Amendment's jury trial right. Serpe's legal team has claimed that by making the monetary penalty go away, HISA and HIWU are trying to set up a situation whereby the trainer can't then go to court and plead that the fine was issued in an unconstitutional manner. According to HIWU's online portal that lists resolved cases since the agency's inception, 12 of the 15 adjudications for clenbuterol resulted in fines of at least $15,000. In two instances, the anti-doping violations were withdrawn, and in one other case the split sample did not confirm the presence of the drug, so the charge was dropped. So is the non-pursuit of a fine against Serpe an unexpected policy change for HISA and HIWU? Or, put another way, should trainers who get charged with ADMC violations expect that they, too, might now have their fines not pursued by HIWU? Alexa Ravit, HIWU's communications director, gave this explanation when TDN queried the agency last month, before Serpe's decision was made public. “HIWU was directed by HISA to not pursue a fine against Mr. Serpe based on the facts and circumstances of his specific case,” Ravit wrote in a June 27 email. “It is not indicative of a broader policy to stop pursuing fines for potential ADMC Program violations.” Bradford Beilly, an attorney for Serpe, told TDN on Monday, July 14, that the non-pursuit of a fine is, as Serpe's legal team has alleged in court filings, an attempt to avoid federal court jurisdiction over a constitutional issue. “It appears that HIWU has followed HISA's direction to not seek a fine to attempt to moot the federal court's jurisdiction over Serpe's Seventh Amendment claim,” Beilly said. “It appears that HISA's representation to the court that it does not control HIWU is not an accurate statement.” Although U.S. District Court (Southern District of Florida) Judge David Leibowitz ended up writing in a May 29 order that he was denying Serpe's request for a preliminary injunction, he also ruled that he would be leaving open the opportunity for Serpe to refile his Seventh Amendment injunction claim at a later time after the HIWU arbitration process had been completed. Beilly told TDN that now that the arbitrator has released that HIWU decision (dated July 9, but not posted to HIWU's online portal until July 14) the legal team will focus on the next steps in Serpe's case. “We will be filing a notice of appeal with the FTC in the [HIWU] administrative proceeding as required and renewing the motion for preliminary injunction against the FTC in the federal district court action,” Beilly said. Jeffrey Benz, the arbitrator, only mentioned the word “fine” once in his 16-page decision, in a section detailing the consequences that HIWU had sought against Serpe. “HIWU could have also sought its legal fees and the fees of the Arbitrator and the arbitration institution as well as the statutory fine permitted for these cases, but it declined to do so,” the arbitrator wrote in a decision. Clenbuterol is a bronchodilator that is approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for the management of horses with airway obstruction. Clenbuterol cannot be administered to any HISA “covered horse” other than in the context of a valid veterinarian-client-patient relationship in accordance with the conditions set forth in ADMC rules. According to the arbitrator's decision, a post-race urine and blood samples were taken from Fast Kimmie during her Saratoga post-race test. The filly's clenbuterol concentration came back as 27 picograms per milliliter in urine. The blood sample was negative. Serpe, a licensed trainer since 1984 who has maintained a nearly violation-free record while campaigning graded stakes winners up and down the East Coast, denied he had authorized any veterinarian to dose Fast Kimmie with clenbuterol. He chose to have the split samples tested at his own expense. The urine confirmed the clenbuterol presence and the blood again negated it. Serpe pointed out in his defense that Fast Kimmie had undergone out-of-competition (OOC) testing at the behest of HIWU on June 19, 2024, nearly eight weeks before her Saratoga win, and that no prohibited substances were detected in her blood at that time. On Dec. 11, 2024, another OOC test on Fast Kimmie took blood and hair samples. This was four months after her positive test at Saratoga, and both samples tested negative for clenbuterol. Benz summed up his arbitration decision this way: “Mr. Serpe contests the [positive finding] on the basis of negative results of a hair sample analysis which he submits 'directly conflict' with the urine adverse analytical finding (AAF)….Mr. Serpe claims that this calls into question the accuracy of the initial urine testing because if Clenbuterol was administered to Fast Kimmie, the hair testing results should have returned a positive finding… “Mr. Serpe's position must be rejected. First, while hair is an acceptable sample matrix in testing for the Presence of Banned Substances, the ADMC Program is a single-matrix regime whereby a single split urine sample is sufficient to establish an AAF [and] no supplemental testing in another matrix–hair, blood, or otherwise-is required,” the arbitrator wrote. “Mr. Serpe also attempts to defeat the [finding] on the basis of Fast Kimmie's negative OOC anti-doping results prior to and after the Aug. 10, 2024, positive urine test that resulted in the AAF. This argument should also be rejected. “First, nowhere in the ADMC Program does it provide that prior or subsequent testing is relevant [thus] HIWU's burden of proof is met when the B Sample analysis confirms the presence of a Banned Substance detected in the A Sample,” Benz wrote. “The ADMC Program is crystal clear: 'it is not necessary to demonstrate intent, Fault, negligence, or knowing Use on the part of” Mr. Serpe to establish a Presence-based [finding]. Moreover, Clenbuterol is not a Threshold Substance, and the quantity of the substance found in the Sample is entirely irrelevant for the purposes of establishing the [finding]. Mr. Serpe cannot try to rewrite the ADMC Program Rules,” Benz wrote. “Mr. Serpe's defense hangs entirely on the bald assertion that inadvertent exposure to Clenbuterol may have resulted from cross-contamination,” the arbitrator wrote. “Mr. Serpe speculates that Fast Kimmie may have been exposed to Clenbuterol from an 'unidentifiable third party or the inadvertent contamination of the urine sample in the testing barn.' The evidence adduced by Mr. Serpe falls well short of establishing on a balance of probabilities the source of Clenbuterol. He has not provided any affirmative evidence of contamination,” Benz wrote. “Mr. Serpe was at all times strictly liable for any violations of the ADMC Program committed by other Covered Persons, employees, personnel, agents, or other Persons involved in the care, treatment, training, or racing of Fast Kimmie,” Benz wrote. “It is thus no defense for Mr. Serpe to point the finger at a blacksmith or unidentified exercise rider and provide no additional explanation of any precautions taken by Mr. Serpe to ensure that his Covered Horse was not inadvertently exposed to a Banned Substance,” Benz wrote. Benz summed up: “Despite the findings of this Arbitrator, no one should read this decision as determining that Mr. Serpe is a cheater. The only determination that can be taken from the findings in this Final Decision is that Mr. Serpe was unable to meet his burden and standard of proof under the applicable rules.” Fast Kimmie is owned by WellSpring Stables. Following her DQ from the win at Saratoga last summer, she was off for eight months. Now age five, Fast Kimmie has raced twice this spring in New York, most recently winning a $17,500 claimer at Aqueduct May 24. The post Arbitrator Suspends Serpe Two Years, but Unlike Other Clenbuterol Cases, HIWU Does Not Pursue Any Fine appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions. View the full article
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