Unfair advantage
Using performance-enhancing drugs to gain an edge over opponents in sport is nothing new. While giving a racehorse cocaine to win a race seems far-fetched, Nevada’s recent action against a trainer illustrates the lengths some will go.
horse tested positive for cocaine after winning a 2025 race
This desire to win at all costs resurfaced in Nevada recently, where regulators equally outraged and baffled revoked the license of a Utah trainer whose horse tested positive for cocaine after winning a 2025 race at the Elko County Fairgrounds.
The Nevada Gaming Commission tossed Alvaro Torres’ license and fined him $5,000 after an investigation into The Saime Pro’s winning performance.
Torres’ The Saime Pro won a maiden special-weight 300-yard quarter-horse race at $11.80 for the win, winning his handlers a $7,000 purse in the process.
Repercussions
After The Saime Pro triumphed at the Elko meet, its handlers were required to submit their champion for mandatory drug testing. The horse was found to have been doped with cocaine.
As with humans, cocaine is a stimulant and performance-enhancer that can block out muscular pain. While coked-up horses are rare, they are not without precedent.
Nevertheless, the finding thrust Nevada gaming commissioners out of their typical day-to-day regulatory comfort zone. The normal fine under NGC rules is a maximum fine of $1,000 fine and a 180-day suspension for the trainer.
The NGC on Thursday, however, sided with Nevada Racing Steward Doug Ray who demanded a harsher penalty, hitting Torres with the $5k fine, revoking his license for five years, and ruling that the winnings from the purse be redistributed.
NGC Commissioners attending the hearing with Deputy Attorney General John Michela expressed their outrage and concerns on the effect on horses and the jockeys riding their overstimulated steeds. Ex-judge and NGC Commissioner Abbi Silver told the hearing: “Cocaine could have killed that horse and that would constitute animal cruelty.”
Whodunnit?
“I spoke to the trainer and he claims he has no idea how the substance got into the horse and would not provide any answers as to where that drug could have come from,” Olsen told the hearing.
While Torres is held responsible for breaking NGC rules, as Commission Brian Krolicki grudgingly accepted, there was “doubt how the narcotic got into the horse. I accept that, and I just wished we knew who it was.”
Cocaine doping of horses has made headlines in the UK, with high-profile trainer Ed Dunlop getting into trouble after his horse Lucidity tested positive for cocaine after placing in a 2023 race. The biggest UK doping scandal came in 2018 after the expensively purchased racehorse Walk In The Sun tested positive after winning at at Kempton.
As with Torres, no blame could be directly attached to Dunlop as to who gave the horse drugs. Walk In The Sun and The Saime Pro, have remained of course, tight-lipped.
