Re: Wrapping legs

[Sue Brown <sbrown@wamedes.com>]

At 09:00 AM 9/13/01 -0700, you wrote:

>Hi Sue,
>
>But after years of reading ridecamp and talking to endurance riders I have
>learned one truth-
>everyone does things differently, and what absolutely won't work for one
>rider/horse combination will certainly work for another!

Hi Karen,
I've found that if I *know* about all of the options, I can make better
decisions and feel more confident about them when I make them.
Shoot...what works for one of my horses probably won't work for his buddy
in the next stall.  But if you only know one way, you won't know how to
handle variations between horses or situations -- or you won't realize that
the one way you learned may actually not be in the horse's best interest. <g>

>
>I have seen some top ten riders do things that I cringe at (get to camp very
>late the night before a ride-not walk the horse and then get up late the
>next day, hope on the horse with no warm up at all and go bombing off), with
>no problems!!!  

At least not that we see immediately. <g>  We try to arrive early enough
that we can take them for a ride (a slow couple of hours) then vet them
thru after they've had that chance to warm up.  We get up 2 or more hours
ahead of our start time and try to be mounted a half hour before the start
time (each person has their job in the morning) -- and then start with a
fast walk or a slow (ha!) trot at the back of the pack.  We tend to ride
with other riders who's horses go at a pace similar to ours' so we won't be
tempted to go faster than we feel we should or slower than is comfortable
for our horses.  We have gradually increased our speed and the distance
(but not both at the same time) and, so far, have fairly sane horses who
look pretty decent at the vet checks.

Hopefully I will have more horses doing 50s next year...I have 3 now -- one
who has done several (3 with me riding), one who has done 2, and another
who has done one.  I anticipate they will do more next year than this year.
 There are 3 more who should be ready next season to start 50s...so I think
I should have an opportunity or two to find out how many ways a problem can
emerge. <bg>

The amount I've learned from ridecamp is tremendous...I try to remember as
much as I can so that I can sort thru it when I come across a problem and
hopefully come up with a solution that will work for that horse.  I learn
the most when I see a lot of different responses to one question...one of
those responses may some day be exactly what I may need.

Sue




*************
Sue Brown 
Tyee Farm
ARICP Certified Riding Instructor
Recreational Riding and Dressage
Marysville, Wa. 
sbrown@wamedes.com