Medina Spirit, a 3-year-old colt trained by Bob Baffert for owner Amr Zedan’s Zedan Racing Stables, went wire to wire under jockey John Valazquez to win the Kentucky Derby on May 1 at Churchill Downs, in Louisville, Kentucky. The Derby win, a record seventh for Baffert, could be overturned if a second round of testing, known as a split sample, also shows the presence of betamethasone.
The Racing Medication and Testing Consortium states that betamethasone is “widely used in equine veterinary medicine as a steroidal anti-inflammatory.” Several equine products approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration include betamethasone for intra-articular use in joints to control pain associated with inflammation and osteoarthritis.
Medina Spirit trainer Bob Baffert admits to using ointment with steroid after Kentucky Derby horse tests positive
Updated: 12 May 2021, 5:52
MEDINA Spirit’s trainer has admitted to using ointment containing steroids after the Kentucky Derby horse tested positive for steroids.
Bob Baffert, 68, said in a statement on Tuesday the horse had undergone treatment before the big race with an ointment containing the steroid betamethasone.
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Bob Baffert said he had an anti-fungal ointment called Otomax on the advice of his vetCredit: Reuters
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Medina Spirit won the Kentucky Derby on May 1 but later tested positive for a steroidCredit: Reuters
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Betamethasone is illegal in racing when found in the horse s blood on race dayCredit: Alamy
About That Connection Between SGF-1000 And Dexamethasone Sponsored by:
When news broke last weekend that Medina Spirit had tested positive for the corticosteroid betamethasone, Paulick Report staff received several questions from readers asking about a phone conversation intercepted by federal agents. Court documents from the federal indictments of March 2020 recalled a conversation between trainer Jason Servis and veterinarian Dr. Kristian Rhein in which they were discussing a substance called SGF-1000, which prosecutors say was one of the misbranded or adulterated drugs at the heart of the case. Rhein told Servis that the substance could sometimes create a false positive for “dex,” widely believed to refer to dexamethasone, and Servis asked Rhein to alter his veterinary records to make it appear as though horses had been treated with dexamethasone in case of a positive test.