Re: [RC] [RC] horses with higher pulses-stephanie caldwell - terry banister
"'cause if I'm giong to be out there I want to be at the top. So,
that gives me some time to see how
things work and learn hands on about endurance before I go try to be
competitive."
So, HELLO everyone. The above quote is 1/2 of our answer! We need to call a
spade a spade. We need to start with reality and acknowledge and ADMIT that
Endurance IS a "competative sport". Endurance IS a RACE, not just a ride.
Call them "rides" and then giving prizes and awards for winning, is not
healthy. Tevis started endurance rides. But it was only a very few rides
after the first one that people who had "been there done that" wanted
something more. So "First Place", "Top Ten" and "BC" recognition and prizes
were instituted. Take those prizes and recognitions away, and imagine what
would happen to the sport of endurance as well as International
Competition. Those people who enter a 50-miler and call it a "Ride," and
have no plans of trying to win or top 10 are no different that trainers that
enter their horse in a flat-track race for reasons other than winning every
time. It's still a RACE (look it up in the dictionary).
The second half of our problem with horses crashing is that even when we
acknowledge that we are in a race, we all prepare and ride to the best of
our ability and knowledge. No rider wants to see their horse in trouble.
Even the "ego" racers who supposedly don't care about their horse, do not
want vet bills and bad publicity, so they would fix the problem immediately,
if they knew when and how. The issue is that we do not have a RED LINE on
our instrument panels, and riders and pit crew (vets) do not YET have
definitive tests to determine the chemical "red line" for an individual
horse. So until we do, we have to continue racing in a fog. We know why some
horses crash when others continue happily onward: The horse that crashed
tipped over the line chemically (and you know how many variables can come
into that formula) at some point, and there was not an immediate warning
beeper. He may have continued moving and looking the same, and only
gradually and later did the fact become obvious.
We can say it is rider responsibility to prevent horses crashing, but it is
quite obvious that when it happens, the riders are saying they DON'T KNOW
why the horse crashed or what to do about it (or they would have prevented
it). I loved the blood test that Dr. Mark did at the Hog Wild ride this
year. It showed my horse, and several others, early on had high potassium
and low sodium levels. If we want to refine the sport and prevent horse
treatments/deaths, we need to focus ($$$) on the continued research for the
fixes for these imbalances (diet, e-lytes, medications), and monitoring
systems (chemical and mechanical).
In the meantime, I believe we are in touch with reality if we admit that
racing has its appeal precisely because of the factor of the unknown, and
horse racing does require living "vehicles." So we can pick our "position"
accordingly.
Terry
"May the Horse be with you"
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