The Kane study somehow came to such conclusions as a horse was 14 times more likely to break down if wearing grabs, as opposed to rims, and according to some articles such as in The Thoroughbred Times and The AFA Journal, horses with feet flaring to the outside were more likely to stay sound than horses with semetrically correct feet. When proponents of this study are asked about such findings, the answer has been that the study has been misinterpreted, or taken out of context. My observations of shoes and breakdowns, covers a lot more than 2 years of study, along with the combined years of my colleagues. Race tracks are not perfect surfaces, in spite of attempst to make them so. They have hard spots, soft spots, grooves where harrow teeth drag, they have turns.
Horses run closely together, accidents happen.
We recently had a race here, where a horse in front fell, and four others tripped over her. If the tripped horses horses had died as a result, and they had regular toe grabs, they would have contributed to the 14 times more likely statistics under the Kane study. Horses are not always sound, they have problems not associated with shoes. They have to check, change paths, get bumped, bobble at the start. Hopefully, the ongoing study will accurately provide some information useful to those who make the decisions as to choice of shoes.