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[RC] Ground Control shoes - DreamweaverI've read the previous posts about Ground Control shoes which were great and very informative. Are there any new experiences, suggestions, success stories, or negative feedback from users (or previous users)? Thanks- in advance- for sharing, and sorry to bring up the topic again for those who might be bored with it!! Katie After using them for a full year, I still think they are great for certain horses and/or certain circumstances. They obviously won't work for everybody. To start with, you want to have a horse that has good hoof quality to begin with. You need a good amount of hoofwall thickness, and nice balanced feet that fit the shape of the shoe, and also very important is a farrier that applies them properly. Most of the failures I have seen I have felt were due more to improper application than anything. Yet, they still may not have worked had they been applied better, I don't know. The pros of the shoes are that they are shock absorbing. They are lighter, which has been a benefit to my horse Chief who is very short backed. Since they are plastic, they flex so if applied properly are not likely to be pulled off. The negatives are that after doing a few rides in the same set, they wear and flex and are more likely to get rocks stuck in there. Also, small pebbles can work their way in which seems to only be a problem on certain rides. Another negative is that if you have a loose shoe problem on the trail, you can't put an easyboot on over it. I had to stop frequently at Bryce to pick rocks out of my horses feet, probably because he had started that ride on a set of shoes that had already done one 50. So for the next 5 day I put him in metal shoes and foamed easyboots on and that worked well. It worked because he had 4 boots on and the weight difference was similar front to rear. Then the next ride, I still had him in metal shoes but tried only putting easyboots on the fronts. That didn't work, because he had more weight on the fronts than the backs, he was now not breaking over the same way and kept stepping on the back of the easyboots, so they came off and he did most of that 2 day ride in plain metal shoes, and another one day ride after that. He went back into Ground Controls for the next ride, which was a 3 day ride. He did okay there, but it was a pretty rocky course and he got rocks stuck in them again. So then back to metal shoes and he did his last ride in those. Now I am keeping him in metal and will foam easyboots on all 4 feet for his last ride of the season. After that I'm not sure what I'll do. He is adapting fairly well to using easyboots, so I may continue that route as well as I think that ultimately the best protection for my horses is to have foamed on easyboots over metal shoes. Unless it's at a ride like the Dust Devil in Oregon -- that one we could have done barefoot the footing was so exceptionally good. :-) Karen in NV =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= 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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