Horse races are a thrilling spectacle, and the sport has had a profound influence on our culture. But it is also one of the most cruel and senseless abuses of a living creature that human beings have devised. Horse racing is not just cruel, it’s often deadly for horses. According to the animal rights organization PETA, ten thousand American thoroughbreds are slaughtered each year because of this sport. Pushed beyond their limits, many are drugged with cocktails of legal and illegal substances to mask injuries and improve performance. The pounding they endure as they run causes them to bleed from the lungs, a condition known as exercise-induced pulmonary hemorrhage.

Then, to add insult to injury, many of these horses are euthanized. The cruelty of horse race is an industry-wide problem, and if the sport wants to survive, it must show that it truly cares about the athletes at its core. That starts with safety rules and doping guidelines, but it’s going to require much more. Breeding practices that produce fast horses that may be more prone to other health problems should also come under scrutiny.

There are essentially three types of people in the horse racing world. There are the crooks who dangerously drug their horses, the dupes who labor under the fantasy that the sport is broadly fair and honest, and the masses in the middle, neither naive nor cheaters but honorable souls who know that it’s more crooked than it ought to be but don’t do enough to change it.

Despite the fact that horse racing has been around for thousands of years, it’s difficult to pin down when it actually started. However, archeological evidence suggests that it became popular in ancient Greece and Rome, and it was a significant part of the Olympic Games between 700 and 40 B.C.

In modern times, there are a variety of different types of horse racing. The most common are flat races, which have no hills and cover distances of up to two miles. These races are referred to as sprints in the United States and routes in Europe. A longer, endurance-style race is a staying race.

Flat races are usually governed by a set of rules that govern the way they are conducted and the amount of weight a horse must carry. In addition, the sex of a horse and its training are important considerations. There are also a variety of handicap races, which are run over the same course but have different prize money, depending on the level of competition.