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Re: [RC] [RC] Real Sports-Bryan Gumble - Hannah Bowen

Is that horse deaths, human deaths or a combo?  AERC competitions are at 8-10 horse deaths/year and I believe 0 human deaths that are legitimately Endurance-induced.

Hullo, weenie adult amateur eventer and closet wannabe endurance rider here.  I'll return to lurkdom shortly, but since this is my sport...

It's rider deaths, unfortunately.  I don't have horse death numbers to hand, but they're similarly discouraging.  The rider deaths (and catastrophic injuries) seem to mostly be a rotational fall problem: horse strikes solid fence in such a way that it can't get its front legs out in front in time to land safely and instead flips, sometimes catching the rider between itself and the ground.  The horse deaths seem to be a combo of falls at obstacles and pulmonary hemorraghe.  What's causing the falls, of course, varies tremendously depending on how you ask.

This NY Times article from a few months back doesn't suck as a state-of-the-sport summary: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/29/sports/othersports/29eventing.html

The good news (insofar as there can be good news in this sort of situation) is that the eventing community is well aware of and deeply concerned with the problem and there are a variety of plans afoot to address it; some rule changes are already in place (though whether they're wise ones does, again, depend on who you ask).  We shall see what ends up happening and how much good it does...

Maybe of some interest to you folks: eventing hero Denny Emerson has done some pointing towards your sport as a worthy example of rider responsibility, sensible handling of crisis situations, etc.

Cheers,
Hannah

Replies
Re: [RC] Real Sports-Bryan Gumble, Diane Trefethen