Hoofing It! Vineland Woman Nabs First Place in Atlantic City 10K to Help Horses Abused for Racing
For Immediate Release:
October 25, 2024
Contact:
David Perle 202-483-7382
She’s the mane event! To help raise money for PETA’s work to stomp out the cruelty and deaths in the horse racing industry, 24-year-old local resident Starlynn Costa blazed the boardwalk in the AmeriHealth Atlantic City 10K on October 19, winning first place in the overall female division with a time of 36:05. Next up, she’ll give the horse racing industry a run for its money in the Chartway Norfolk Harbor 10K in Norfolk, Virginia, on Sunday, November 24. Costa is available for interviews.
“I choose to run, but the horses who are whipped and drugged—all for a time on the clock—have no choice,” says Costa, a vegan athlete. “I’m proud to contribute to PETA’s work to clean up this dangerous, deadly industry.”
Costa, who was born in Minnesota, earned her undergraduate and graduate degrees in communications at the University of Mary in Bismarck, North Dakota, and the University of South Alabama in Mobile, Alabama, respectively, before moving to Vineland to be closer to family. She was inspired to start running after watching the film Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron, in which a horse named Spirit saves other horses from being ridden by humans. That story, along with going vegan, helped lead her down a path of professional animal activism.
Now an assistant correspondent at peta2—part of PETA’s youth division—Costa works with students to help them plan animal rights events at their schools. She’s participated in several PETA actions herself, including protesting outside the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show to slam breeders for contributing to the homeless-animal overpopulation crisis and helping coordinate a tour of Ellie the Elephant, the group’s life-size animatronic elephant who visits schools across the country to teach students about the cruelty of animal circuses and elephant rides. In her spare time, Costa writes pro-animal rap lyrics and bakes vegan treats for her dog, Eby, whom she shares with her grandmother.
PETA notes that horses are herd animals who can feel stressed and lonely if forced to live alone and that they mourn each other’s deaths. They use different vocalizations to communicate greetings, departures, mating calls, and danger, and mother horses make a deep soothing sound when nursing their babies. PETA investigations have exposed that in the racing industry, injured, overmedicated horses are forced to sprint—often under the threat of whips and even illegal electric shock devices—at speeds so fast that they frequently sustain fatal injuries or hemorrhage from the lungs. Three horses die every day on U.S. racetracks, and some of those who survive are sent to slaughter when they’re no longer profitable.
PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to use for entertainment”—points out that Every Animal Is Someone and offers free Empathy Kits for people who need a lesson in kindness. For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow the group on X, Facebook, or Instagram.
