"Dr. Frazier told the riders a the Pan Am's that in events such as this one
out of 100 horses will die because of the event. Is that acceptable - not to
me"
I totally agree, but we must keep the differences
between a championship ride, and ordinary ride, and the unique problems of
rookie riders separate!
Rookie riders may hurt their horses by
ignorance. Education and perhaps special rules (speed, mentors, baby
sitters, etc) may help.
Ordinary rides may have horses that have been
trailered to long and are dehydrated (at the PAC all of the horses had
been there for a week- certainly enough time to recover) Riders may need to be
encouraged to stop to allow horses to eat. Perhaps experience levels
before longer distances. Perhaps log books and a lot of things I can't
think of right now.
FEI champ rides. The riders are experienced,
they have coaches. The horses are on site for a long time. The
horses have demonstrated that they can go the distance. The riders are
going to go very fast. There is a (relatively) a lot of money. Blood
testing before and during the ride is possible. Complicated and expensive
diagnostics (x-ray and/or ultrasound) could be done before the ride.
Special rules (like 52 pulse or extra stop and go stops) would be
feasible. Better provision for treatment is possible (the PAC did a good
job, but things could be improved)
Let us be very
careful that the various types of rides, riders and horses are kept in
mind. If to many rookie riders are killing their horses, target them with
things that will help that group. If to many ordinary riders and rides
have problems, target them. If would class events have real problems,
(which I believe they do) target the world class events.
Ed
Ed and Wendy Hauser Sisu West 2994 Mittower
Road Victor, MT 59875
