Paco Lopez, mocks HISA, skirts suspension, business as usual
Sport of Kings, not so fast, pun intended
Last week the FIA — Formula 1’s governing body — issued an official statement regarding Max Verstappen. The three-time world champion, the sport’s biggest active star, had asked a journalist to leave a press conference. One incident. The FIA reviewed it publicly, cited his obligations as a participant, referenced his role model status, and put their concerns in writing for the entire world to see.
Read that again. They went on record — about a press conference.
Now let’s talk about Paco Lopez.
We published The Ethics Gap in February, documenting how Lopez had accumulated over 100 whipping violations at Fair Grounds while simultaneously serving a six-month HISA suspension — a suspension he effectively rendered meaningless by relocating to Louisiana, which remains in litigation against HISA mandates. We sent formal letters to the Louisiana Racing Commission, to Churchill Downs Inc., and to HISA CEO Lisa Lazarus asking direct questions about enforcement, consistency, and integrity.
To her credit, Lazarus did respond — on X. Her answer: because of the ongoing Louisiana court case, HISA could not count anything Lopez did there against him. The violations didn’t count. The rides didn’t count. The suspension clock, for all practical purposes, didn’t run.
We understand the legal complexity. We do not accept the conclusion that nothing could be done.
HISA had — and retains — the authority to begin enforcing a suspension the moment Lopez attempted to return to a HISA-covered track. They could have required him to serve the full remaining balance before his first ride back. They chose not to. The loophole that allowed him to ride through his suspension in Louisiana was bad enough. The decision not to close it on the back end removed any remaining pretense that the penalty meant anything at all.
Lopez is now allowed at HISA-covered tracks. The suspension is, for all practical purposes, history.
The FIA sanctioned their biggest star for a press conference dispute. Horse racing’s governing body confirmed in public that its own suspension couldn’t survive a state line.
On the cockfighting — a brief note, because it deserves one.
We asked the question in November 2025. It was documented. It was on the record. The industry’s response was, as we noted at the time, the sound of expensive silence. The mainstream racing press buried it. The relevant governing bodies buried it. The riders in question continued riding Grade 1 favorites without interruption, without public accountability, and without a single official statement from anyone with actual authority over the sport.
Buried, for now. These things have a way of resurfacing. We haven’t forgotten, and neither have the people who sent us what we saw.
In December, we asked Will The Real Sport of Kings Please Stand Up — making the case that Formula 1 had already claimed that title in every measurable category: revenue, global reach, cultural relevance, institutional professionalism.
The FIA statement last week added a dimension we didn’t fully quantify in that piece: accountability culture.
Formula 1 holds its participants — including its most irreplaceable ones — to documented, public standards of conduct. When those standards are breached, the governing body responds in writing, on the record, by name. Not because Verstappen is unimportant to the sport. Because the standard is more important than the star.
Horse racing cannot say the same. It has spent the better part of a decade demonstrating the opposite — that the more important you are to the commercial machinery, the less the rules apply to you. Unless of course you have run afoul of the wrong person or “click.” Lopez rides. The cockfighting video gets quietly absorbed. HISA settles disputes in secret. The TAA moves in the background to quiet voices it finds inconvenient.
We documented all of it. We’re still documenting it.
Racing a Thoroughbred is a privilege, not a right. Governing one is a responsibility, not a sinecure. The people holding the reins of this sport’s institutions have confused the two for long enough.
Formula 1 isn’t a perfect sport. But when its governing body puts a star’s name in an official statement over a press conference dispute, it sends an unambiguous message to every participant: the standard applies to you, regardless of your standing.
Horse racing sends a different message. Lopez delivered it himself, riding card by card through a suspension that ceased to exist the moment he crossed a state line — and HISA confirmed it publicly.
One sport means it. One sport performs it.
The world is watching both. And it’s keeping score.
Max:
