 |
RE: [RC] [RC] Pres Cup - Catfish DanielsHi Lisa:I haven't been in the loop lately and I haven't quite followed the trend. But since the subject line of your e-mail reads "President's Cup", I thought I'd like to respond to your post. Specially about the pull-rate that you seem to be very upset about. I have had the pleasure to learn a ton of facts from a good Friend of mine (Fred) who has spent several months in the UAE training and competing on leased horses, and was the only American this year to finish the President's Cup. Anybody that knows Fred, respects him for his accomplishments and most of all on how he treats any horse that he trains and rides. He is definitely an example on responsible horsemanship of Endurance - and and advocate of longevity. Many of us, including myself at times, can learn from him. Horses in the UAE are treated completely different than in the United States. Most of these horses don't come from private residences like yours or my home. They come from specialized endurance stables of 80, 100, and even more horses. They are in climate controlled stables, eat only the best of the best feed, are on very specific training schedules and under DAILY veterinarian observation pre and post daily workouts. Their care is beyond anything I have ever seen in person. Minor, minor injuries that most often go un-noticed by your average endurance rider until later stages of the injury, are indeed detected at the earliest of stages via daily sonograms, and professional examinations. Horses that have the slightest issues or are not 110%, reduce their training immediately and are cared for in the most aggressive and cost demanding way to aid towards full recovery. Having said that, those horses that despite the costly efforts do not appear to get back to 110%, are retired without question and live out the rest of their lives in the most beautiful facilities with the most incredible care. Now, as far as the rides over there. The completion rate is indeed low. Partially due to the high speed of riding - but mostly, their pull criteria is much, much stricter than here in the States. Metabolically, many and many of the horses that pass thru vet check after vet check in our local rides, would be pulled a long time ago due to the different level of pre-caution over there. That goes both for metabolics and lameness. Many, many of the horses that were pulled for lameness are definitely not crippled as you worded it in your post, and in many cases they would not ruled to be lame in most of our local rides here in the States. I so often hear this stigma about the rich oil sheiks buying up horses in the six figures and you never hear of that horse again. That stigma surrouned by rumors that they just ran those horses into the ground. The fact is that the organization there does indeed buy promising prospects at a very high cost. First off, their organization has money, money, and money. They are not afraid to spend it. All too often, a prospect is purchased and to preserve the well-being of the horse, they realize that this horse is not cut out for what they had in mind. So this horse that people think was ran into the ground and never to be heard of again, was consciously decided never to be entered in its debut race, and is in fact living a healthy, incredibly spoiled and wonderful life in an environment that most of us financially could not provide for our horses. The more I am learning about how things are done over there, the more I feel I should share it with fellow endurance riders - if not only for the purpose of lifting some stigma about "the other side of endurance - the UAE". Anyway - congrats to Fred...for finishing with a healthy horse. !!!! Catfish From: "oddfarm" <jsalas@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> To: "ridecamp" <ridecamp@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Subject: [RC] Pres Cup Date: Sun, 18 Feb 2007 12:51:59 -0500 _________________________________________________________________ Play Flexicon: the crossword game that feeds your brain. PLAY now for FREE.? http://zone.msn.com/en/flexicon/default.htm?icid=flexicon_hmtagline =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= 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!! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
|