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[RC] Pulse Recovery - terreThis whole discussion/debate (in all the various forums) reminds me SO much of when "fit to continue" was adopted. All of the same arguments were raised--"what about, yeah but, etc..." In point of fact, very few of us were crossing the finish line with lame horses anyway, so it made no difference to us. What it DID do, which can't be easily quantitated, was change rider attitude. A rider, even one racing, with a 'slightly off' horse at the last vet check would slow down or elect to pull, knowing that if they screwed up they wouldn't even complete. It may have saved a lot of horses from BECOMING lame, rather than just identify the ones that were....and that is the point. But you couldn't have proved it by gathering stats as to "how many horses would be affected, based on past rides".What a lot of the naysayers don't seem to realize is that 15" is a LONG time. Entire HOLDS (after recovering, of course) are sometimes 15" long, during which we vet, feed, electrolyte, etc... The biggest problem is not that horses won't come down in 15", it's that it won't catch many of the tired ones. HOWEVER, if a rider knows his horse is ADR, their 'fear' that the horse might not recover in 15" could motivate them to slow down...which is the better outcome. Riders may become intensely aware of exactly how long it 'normally' takes their horse to recover, and notice for themselves when the recovery isn't as good as usual. I think a lot of people don't really pay attention--they just poke around doing whatever until the PR person tells them they can move on. Why do I think this? Because so many people are worried about it! My feeling is that if they checked back on all their cards, they would find they never came close to taking 15" (see Nancy's post re Turkey Trot). The fact they think it is a problem indicates to me that they are not really aware of how long it takes their horse to recover. I think the investigations will show that most of the horses that have died in the last few years did, indeed, recover within a few minutes of arrival at the check. It appears to me that fit, experienced horses "know how to come down" even if there is something horribly wrong with them. What we may catch are the young/new/inexperienced horses, that are excited as well as tired; and may be in pain/discomfort from tack or whatever--in other words, the newbies (or the oldbies too unmotivated to learn). These are exactly the horses that shouldn't be racing! I have heard a few comments to the effect that "my horse always took 20" to come down for the first few years, until we figured out xxxxx". But, maybe they would have figured it out faster if they had had the incentive of losing their placing! There seems to be a perception that "excitement" is non-significant; ie "my horse was just excited". Well, my experience has been that even young or nervous horses might spike a pulse because of a noise or whatever--but they still come down. A horse that is SO excited that it's pulse sticks higher than mid-60s for 15" is, in my experience, undergoing additional stress equivalent to working--and should be cut a break! This all goes back to rider preparation, and gives the rider a 'reason' to seek education. terre (another novel!) =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Ridecamp is a service of Endurance Net, http://www.endurance.net. Information, Policy, Disclaimer: http://www.endurance.net/Ridecamp Subscribe/Unsubscribe http://www.endurance.net/ridecamp/logon.asp Ride Long and Ride Safe!! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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