SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – This year’s Jockey Club Round Table Conference, which will be held virtually for the second year in a row due to the coronavirus pandemic, will introduce many in the U.S. racing industry to a woman who may play a prominent role in its regulatory future.The veterinarian Tessa Muir, a native of Australia who was hired by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency in April for the newly created position of director of equine science, is slated to deliver half of the conference’s final presentation, an update on the fledgling Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority. Typically, the Jockey Club reserves the last slot of the two-hour Round Table for its highest-priority topic.Muir is the first equine expert to ever be hired by USADA, as the company is known, in expectation that it will begin enforcing national medication standards for U.S. racetracks in the second half of 2022, when HISA is expected to begin operations. USADA, a private, non-profit company that conducts medication and anti-doping controls for the U.S. Olympic team and the Ultimate Fighting Championship league, was specifically named as the enforcement agency for racing in the bill authorizing HISA.Although Muir most recently returned to Australia to work as a regulatory vet for Racing Victoria, she spent the previous six years at the British Horseracing Association. Beginning in 2015, she headed up the association’s anti-doping program, at the same time the BHA began implementing updated rules and testing protocols. A biography distributed by The Jockey Club says that Muir was “responsible for development of anti-doping strategy and policy, test planning, equine anti-doping research, and development and roll-out of the BHA’s digital sampling system.”Because racing anti-doping regulators maintain extensive contacts among other racing jurisdictions, Muir is known among U.S. regulators, despite having no experience working in the country.“She is bright, she brings a strong résumé to the position, and she is young, which I think is important because we need people like that in the U.S. who are ready to step into leadership roles,” said Mary Scollay, the executive director of the Racing Medication and Testing Consortium. Scollay is a member of one of the committees advising the board of HISA.Scollay said that Muir’s lack of experience in the U.S. wasn’t necessarily a disadvantage given the inertia within the U.S. regulatory community, where significant change often gets bogged down in historically fraught disagreements between the myriad constituents of the sport.“I think a fresh perspective and fresh set of eyes will be important,” said Scollay. “Someone who can sit back and look objectively at what needs to stay and what needs to go.”Although USADA is the doping-control agency for the U.S. Olympic team, the company notably has no prior experience in the equine sphere. While the organization does test the human members of the U.S. Olympic Equestrian Team, the horses are monitored and tested instead by the United States Equine Federation.Opponents of the effort to install a national regulator for the sport had pointed to USADA’s lack of experience in equine doping control to argue against the bill, contending that the sport shouldn’t rely on a newcomer to design and enforce its complex medication-control program. Hiring Muir in April was a way to answer those critics and allow her to dive into the project with 15 months of a head start.Some of those critics are also hoping that Muir doesn’t get a chance to fulfill her role. A large and varied number of racetracks, racing commissions, national and state horsemen’s organizations, and associations representing Quarter Horse and Standardbred racing and breeding interests have joined in a lawsuit seeking to invalidate the federal legislation, arguing that it violates several constitutional doctrines regarding delegation of powers, among other objections.HISA and its supporters have argued that the legislation was specifically designed to pass constitutional muster, and they have said that the lawsuit will have no impact on the authority’s ability to complete its work prior to its July 2022 launch date. Sharing the last slot at the Round Table with Muir will be Charles Scheeler, the chairman of the authority. Scheeler, a retired attorney who led an investigation into substance abuse in Major League Baseball as the former lead counsel for Sen. George Mitchell, is expected to use his portion of the presentation to outline the authority’s progress so far and its goals for the next several months.Other presentations at the Round Table will focus on aftercare, marketing, race-timing, and the activities of The Jockey Club over the past year. The livestream of the conference will start at 10 a.m. on Sunday.