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The system works only if the people comply with it. The veterinarian did cautiion the rider.
Sometimes things slip through the veterinary inspection. I had vet secretaried for a newish endurance vet,
and the last time I saw her she commented that it’s not the horses that she worried about through the
ride that crashed, it was the ones that showed little signs of metabolic stress.
The last ride I did we vetted through okay, low gut sounds but that’s normal for Beau and supposedly
all the other horses were having low gut sounds. But he was acting WEIRD during lunch. I was thinking
of pulling. Then he started to pee – light, darker than dark tea color at the last spurt. That did it for me.
I might have been a weenie, but it was 105degF with no real water until the next vet stop 19 miles away.
The vet ran a CRI and although his resting rate was fine, he had an elevated rate after so he believed
it was a “muscle” issue, and he agreed with me and was glad I came back to have him checked.
I’m glad I pulled – there were four horses on IV at this ride and a very stressed vet/RM. He had mandatory
30 minute gate into holds with a pulse criteria of 60 bpm, cautioned the riders, told them that he was real
leary of the heat conditions out there and to GO SLOW. One horse went to the hospital for colic before
lunch.
One of the riders was just walking over to the vets to tell them that she was pulling at lunch, and her
horse just decided to lay down and not get up. This horse had vetted through fine, too at lunch.
The horse is fine, but they played conservative and put her on IV.
I don’t think that ride managers and veterinarians are the ones responsible for a horses metabolic
failure. It is ultimately the rider’s responsibility. Ride managers and veterinarians do their best
and that’s all they can do under these circumstances.
I mean, if this is a “system failure” the Tevis is one massive “system failure” too. To me, this is
rider(coach) failure.
K.
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