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Some personal comments after following this tread for quite some time now,
and getting ever more angry.

Yeah, you better believe I'm underappreciating the kid who won the WEC last
year. I guess it's a relative thing. The kid compared to all the teams with
riders who do all the training, conditioning and care for their mounts vs.
flat-track jockeys who, as I understand it, are hired guns for the race only
and it's that way across the board for every horse.

So you better never let youself be caught on somebody elses horse in a
competition. Never, ever!
How can one (not you only, but all of those "hate jockey people") be so ...
(have no word for that), as to call any person riding somebody elses horse
in a competition a "jockey" and thereby mean he should not be called an
endurancerider at all.
Do not many of them have one or more horses at home, caring for them,
conditionig them, bringing them along? And then for one reason or the other
are not able to compete on that specific horse at that event. How do you
know anything of them, and their horsemanship at one glance, seeing them
riding somebody elses horse. And some of you even do that "see theeese
countries, and seee our US riders". So I assume all top level US riders
start all these top level horses from scratch all by themselves. Nobody
would even consider buying a proven endurance horse, and nobody ever allows
somebody else to ride their horses in training, let alone in competition.
HA! Lying abit to yourself aren´t you?

In endurance at the upper levels, I'd like to see HORSEMEN. I don't want to
see jockeys, at any level of endurance racing, no matter how talented or
athletic they are.

Funny definition of "Horsemen" you got there.

I personally don't know of anyone who
does 100's without designated crew plus whoever else is nearby to lend a
hand, yet clearly some do, at least for Old Dominion. What an
accomplishment!! What terrific horsemanship.

Somehow I totaly fail to see any horsemanship here.
Do you really think the (likely worn out) rider can take much better care
for the horse than a two people crew can? Do you think it´s no good for the
horse to have acess to some extra waterbuckets and some mouthfull of food
between the vetchecks? Can´t see how the rider can do that all by himself.
And don´t you agree that being a good rider instead a bag of sand in the
saddle really helps the horse? It sure helps the rider ride a big lot better
if he gets at least some rest in the vetcheck.
Should not "Horsemanship" be all about the horses wellfare? Does
"Horsemanship" need to be showed off, or isn´t it rather in the small
things, the passersby will never see anyway?

To make my point clear: I did shorter distances "cavalry". That was fine as
long as one is not competetive and the cavalry riders are cared for (some
stops even have no "public buckets" at all. Want to teach your horse to
drink out of a garden-hose?).
As I moved on to longer trails and more competetive riding, I´d rather stay
at home than ask my horse for top level performance without being top level
cared for.
No flame here on people riding cavalry, it´s everybodys own decision. I know
it´s hard work but I suppose some of them might not do it because they like
it so much, but rather because they simply can´t find somebody to crew. I am
in the very lucky position of having some endurance-interested friends, and
most likely can find at least one person to hold a bucket to my horses nose
and get my things to the vetcheck. I´d go out of my way to find somebody,
but without any help I´d rather not do big rides. And that´s for my horses
welfare and not for my own convenience.
My opinion only.

Happy trails anyway.

Hilga


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