Endurance.Net Ridecamp Archives

Bruce, As always, I love your level-headed explanations and posts on 
ridecamp. It was great to finally meet you at the Moab ride. My question 
on the behavior of these WEC horses at this elite level in International 
competitions is; "Is this normal, and common in all international 
equestrian competitions with elite horses such as these at this level,?" 
I have absolutely NO experience in international competitions and dang, 
Kathy's Brunjes post and description sure sounded a bit scary. It didn't 
sound like an isolated, single horse or two acting up either with 
limping riders trying to catch their horses after being dumped at the 
start, but this behavior continued into the vet checks too. Does this 
just happen mostly with "racers"? I have never seen coverage where 
international dressage and Olympic jumpers are acting like that DURING a 
competition. They TOO have been transported by trailer,& plane to these 
competitions overseas gone into quarantine, had multiple vet inspections 
and their sleep/wake/feeding schedule/climate/& WORLD/ has been turned 
upside down. The excitement of the atmosphere, spectators, riders, crew, 
cameras, film crews, strangers, different handlers etc. equally apply 
and often includes fireworks too. I just haven't seen any dressage 
horses at the Olympics, go nuts and start racing around crashing, 
bucking and dumping his rider. Theatric not being able to pulse down for 
29 minutes at a vet check, attests that this was indeed unusual for him, 
and at this World Championship level, the qualification of these horses 
means that this is not their first experience at this, they've competed 
more than most in the sport by this time, and been through the same 
routine a bazillion times. They know what the start line is,as well as 
what is supposed to happen at the vet checks. Miles, miles, miles, 
experience, experience, experience. Like the original poster asked, 
though the horses are "conditioned", wouldn't their energy, control and 
performance be enhanced and they would do even better if more time was 
also spent in "training" and "ground manners?" Lorenzo the Amazing 
Frenchman's horses ALSO had to go through the whole transportation 
issues but can you imagine what his performance at the opening ceremony 
would have been like had even one of his horses lost his marbles because 
of all the excitement? No they weren't "racing" but they still had to 
perform perfectly under very stressful circumstances so it shows that a 
horse can be trained to focus on the job at hand, whatever it is. I 
understand that you sometimes have to sacrifice in one area in order to 
concentrate on another, but it would seem that training your horse to 
concentrate and behave under these conditions at this level is a "must". 
The only way you can make it around the course to the finish line, is if 
he allows you to stay in the saddle from the very beginning.
Melissa Margetts

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