Response to Biltmore Bruise by L.Salas

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

Brenda Baird kbaird@rev.net
I don't post to this site except maybe once every five years but this requires a response.  Perhaps others have already responded and I haven't read them but, people, before you go spouting off things, please have a clue what you are talking about.  The author of Biltmore Bruise posted on May 7, L. Salas, has no idea what an "FEI" ride is and evidences that in her error-filled message.  There is no money involved in choosing to ride under the FEI rules, which are IN ADDITION TO, NOT IN PLACE OF AERC rules, only the money that goes out of my pocket to pay additional entry fees.  Take time off?  I took the same day of vacation I take to ride any ride.  Paid pit crew?  What planet are you living on?  My friends and family pitch in like they do on any ride.  Special treatment?  No way.  Those who choose to do FEI have to put up with an annoying bunch of nitpicky little extra cosmetic things having only to do with procedures and protocol--like wearing a shirt with a collar on it.  And there's no, "well, we'll let the trail sort out that lameness" under FEI rules--any consistency anywhere and you're out--MUCH more stringent, and therefore protective of the horse, than AERC rules, and using the same wonderful vets everybody at the ride uses, by the way.  How dare people who do not take the time to investigate the facts of situations become advocates against the hard, hard work of managers and volunteers who slave to put on events!  A couple years ago, a very high ranking elected officer of AERC looked me in the face and said that he did not know anything at all about international riding and had no intention of learning about it, and then proceded to campaign vigorously against it to the membership for the next couple of years--completely in ignorance, and has evidently passed that habit on to others.  If you educate yourself, then you've got a right to say something.  Those of you who do otherwise are merely spouting off the rhetoric of other uninformed minds. 

Brenda Baird, Ph.D.
former (emphasis on former) AERC Vice President
and NE Region Director