This Sport as Sport

["guest@endurance.net" <guest@endurance.net>]

K S SWIGART   katswig@earthlink.net


> My interest lies in the competitive sports, because I tend to enjoy 
> competition. In business, in life, and in sport. 

I also enjoy competitive sports.  My sport of choice that we are now talking 
about (endurance riding) is a competitive sport, and the competition is one of 
the reasons that I enjoy it.  The other sports that I referred to in my post 
included fencing and poker which are also both competitive sports.  I 
participate in sailing, not to get on a dingy and cruise around the bay, but as 
part of a crew on a racing yacht.  I have only once in my life been on a sail 
boat that was not either in a race, practicing for a race, or preparing for a 
race.  Where in anything that I have said, did I even allude to an idea that I 
might think that competition is not fun?  I got in to endurance in the first 
place because the horse that I bought with the intent to event on let me know 
early on in the training program that he had no interest in working in an arena 
and that he wanted to be a trail horse.  My response was, "Okay, but if you are 
going to be a trail horse, you're gonna be a competitive trail horse."

> And where you and I disagree is when you assert that there is something 
> wrong, and unsportsmanlike, about the desire to compete, the desire to be the 
> best at what you do. 

Where in my post did I make any such assertion?  The only place where I came 
anywhere close to saying anything about "unsportsmanlike" was when I stated that 
going to a friendly poker game and playing cutthroat poker was considered 
"unsporting" and that you wouldn't get invited back.  I did NOT say that playing 
cutthroat poker was unsporting, only that doing so in a nickel and dime game 
was.  And I made NO comments whatsoever about the rightness or wrongness of a 
desire to compete.

> I can't run the 100m as fast as Carl Lewis, or swim the 
> 100 as fast as any of the people who will qualify for the Olympics this year. 
> But I will watch these people perform with great interest, and thrill at 
> their achievements, without ever thinking, once, that these indivuals who 
> have devoted much of their lives to developing their athletic prowess are 
> somehow lower on the moral totem pole than I. Won't give it a thought. Won't 
> even consider that because I run to the mailbox to pick up the mail that my 
> running is of superior moral content because it is not based on crass 
> competition. 

Where in my post did I make ANY reference to morality AT ALL?  Go ahead and 
quote myself back to me, if you can.

Where it is that people got the idea that I am not competitive is absolutely 
BEYOND me (remember, I'm the one who said that poker for no money is a dumb game 
that I don't play, and that I play high stakes poker!)

I have nothing whatsoever against the desire to win (and nothing I have ever 
said on Ridecamp has ever even come close to saying so).  I do, however, have a 
problem with a desire to win, no matter what the cost.  The opportunities for 
abusing horses in the sport of endurance are rampant.  All the rules in the 
world cannot stop it.  The only thing to stop it is good sportsmanship on the 
part of the participants.  If you turn the sport into a business, the 
businessmen will arrive and after a while, the sportsmen will leave.

Many people appear to be under the mistaken assumption that you must participate 
in endurance (or anything else) either competitively or recreationally (but that 
you can't do both).  This is patently false, and it is this mindset that I would 
actually like to abolish.  It IS possible for COMPETITION to be fun...as long as 
all the players agree on that.  As long as all the players agree that they 
aren't going to beat each other up just so they can win (in endurance you also 
have to agree that you aren't going to beat up your horse too).  There is 
absolutely nothing inherently wrong with competition.  I merely stated that when 
you cease competing for fun, then it ceases to be sport.

It is BECAUSE I like competitive sports that I even mention it.  If ALL I wanted 
to do was trail ride, without any of the competition that is associated with 
endurance riding, I would just trail ride and not bother with endurance. 

Where _I_ would say that Tom and I most disagree is in the effective way to 
communicate with people who may have good ideas. :)

Right now I am almost totally uninterested in the work that he is doing because 
he seems to be more interested in how to get endurance horses to go faster, 
while I am trying to figure out how to get endurance horses to go farther.

kat
Orange County, Calif.