Thoroughbred Racing Questions

I'm going to bounce back over to thoroughbred horse racing as my topic.  Yesterday morning, a large East-coast newspaper decided to run a supposed expose about I'll Have Another, the chestnut colt who won two legs of this years Triple Crown.  They had managed to get copies of the the attending veterinarians' reports of exams and treatments of the colt from before the Kentucky Derby and up to the Belmont, when I'll Have Another was scratched.  The newspaper had several small animal vets look at the records - these were not vets who routinely treat and care for racing horses - and these vets made statements based on their learning experiences in vet school.  The consulted vets said that the exams and treatments given I'll Have Another indicated severe leg, feet, and tendon problems, and that he had been training and running while in great pain.  Four other vets, who deal only with race horses, stated they saw nothing to indicate the small animal vets' statements were correct.  Add to this the fact that Union Rags, who ran behind I'll Have Another in both the Derby and the Preakness, and who went on to win the Belmont Stakes, is now out for the rest of the racing year due to a tendon problem. 
   What is the regular person on the streets to think about the state of horse racing in America and around the world?   There is one set of trained  and licensed veterinarians saying the horse is/was being mistreated; there is a second set, involved with racing, who say that the horse's treatments were very normal.  I can't blame people who know nothing about horses being confused, and not knowing whom to trust.  -  As I have written before, and will, no doubt, write again, I have conflicting feelings about racing.  Horses are not completely mature creatures until they are 8 years old.  Most folks who use horses start breaking and training them when they are 2 or 3 years old, which allows their back and leg muscles, tendons, and joints to begin maturing.  In the world of today's thoroughbred racing, horses are bred to run faster and at very young ages, which causes developmental problems for the legs and back.  Thoroughbred racing is a money-making business, and, as such, can not return to having a horse in it's first race when it is 4 or 5 years old - too much time and effort would be needed to be put into the horse before it could race and show a profit.  It's sad that the horse has to pay the price of man's avarice throughout the world.
   On one other note, Holy Bull, the big grey stallion that was the USA's Horse of the Year in 1994, has been retired from stud duty.  He still loves his mares, but his fertility has plummeted.

Holy Bull in 2011