The horses are getting ready to line up for the start of the 2012 Grand national however one horse, Synchronised, flipped under the pressure of thousands of people watching, filming and gambling on him so he throws his jockey (AP McCoy) to the floor.
After reuniting horse with jockey the race started but before the tenth fence Synchronised has fallen and sustained such injury that he needs to be put down.
Since the 1800's the grand national has been running and since the beginning there has almost always be at least 1 seriously injured horse. I don't know if it is because social networks have been becoming more popular recently or if this has always been a idly spoken about problem but this year there were LOADS of negative status's, tweets and headlines regarding animal cruelty at the grand national. Is it right that horses should be raced so hard that there is a possibility that they might die?
Some people think yes because it is traditional and has happened for the last 100+ years.
Unlike humans, if horses break a bone it doesn't repair it's self, instead it stays broken and causes the horse excruciating pain and pneumonia. This is why horse race organisers decide to put the animals down before the pain gets too bad.
Fortunately, regulations have been made to help horses welfare, like how they made a limit of how many times you could whip your horse. They also changed the grand national course from last year to make it more safe (this didn't work though as there was still horse fatalities).
This raises the question of 'Should horse racing be banned altogether?' However unless something stupidly dangerous happens during a race (which I hope won't happen), Horse racing will continue the way it is now where healthy horses die because of pure human entertainment and greed.
RIP SYNCHRONISED and ACCORDING TO PETE