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[RC] The Reality of Weight Divisions - k s swigartBruce Weary said: Will somebody please call me when someone wins Tevis six times in a row carrying 235? Or wins the WEC with the same weight? Or the OD 100? Or the Californios 100? How about even five days of a Duck's ride? Was there an ROC winner at 235? If the playing field is as level as you say, these things have a very good chance of happening. They only have a good chance of happening if there were a significant number of starters who weigh in at 235 pounds, and there isn't. Tevis hasn't been won six times in a row by somebody weighing in at 110 pounds either. The lack of representation of people weighing 235 pounds among the ranks of the winners is due to the lack of representation of people weighing 235 among the ranks of the starters. At the Californios ride this year, Bruce was probably the only one, and I haven't heard him say anything about whether he was even trying to win the ride. And if he were trying to win the ride, some people (like maybe Jim Holland) might put his lack of success at winning down to his choice of horse (after all, he wasn't riding an Arabian) rather than to his weight. Add to that the fact that of the few starters there are who weigh in at 235 pounds many of them do so because they are fat and out of shape, it shouldn't be beyond the realm of understanding for even a guy who got stuck in the fourth grade to figure out that rider weight may not have as much effect as rider fitness. I can only speak from first hand experience of nearly 8,000 miles on the trail, every inch of it as a heavyweight. Since every inch of his riding has been as a heavyweight, he cannot speak from personal experience of how his horses might have performed if they were to carry him under a lighter load. I CAN. I have varied the load of my horses carrying me by as much as 60 pounds. And I can say, from first hand experience, that my 600 pound horse (yes, that is six hundred pounds, it wasn't a typo) performed much better carrying me and the 45 pound saddle than she did carrying me and the 7 pound saddle. And yes, physics can explain this quite well. The 45 pound saddle did a much better job of distributing the load than the 7 pound saddle did, so that despite the fact that the weight of rider and tack was increased by almost 40 pounds, the load became easier to carry. In our bridge building experiment in high school physics, the load under which the exact same bridges failed would have been markedly different if the way the bridges had been loaded was to use two metal bars at each end with the bucket of weights hanging off of strings attached to both of them rather than a single metal bar with one string hanging down from the middle (more of that force vectors thing that is essential to understanding mechanical physics). I challenge Bruce to perform a test of his own. Next weekend at Tevis, reduce the weight your horse has to carry for the ride by getting rid of your saddle and all of the other stuff you take along with you. This should probably get rid of about 20-25 pounds (around ten percent of the rider's total weight). And after having done this, report back and let us know whether you and your horse performed better or worse than you did last month at Californios. This way, he isn't changing the horse, the rider, or the length of trail (so we are controlling for quite a few of the variables here) all we have done is reduce the weight of the load. After he has done this, THEN he can report back as to just how much effect that 20-25 pounds of difference had on the outcome of his ride. I strongly suspect that his results will be the same as mine, that horses CAN perform better under a heavier load; however, I am willing to let him prove me wrong. Go ride Tevis bareback and THEN tell me that physics says it should be easier for the horse to do it this way. :) kat Orange County, Calif. I have seen how my horses work and recover with my weight, and then observed the same criteria when one of my little daughters rode the same horse the next day. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= 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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