Re: What about Slypners?

[carl meyer <carlmey@citrus.infi.net>]

I've gotten up to three re-sets from a pair of Slypner steels and de-
pending on how much and what I'm doing with my horse, and what type of
surface we're riding on, the inserts go the distance too.

I live in NW Central Fl...it's sandy here...I do seek out hard stuff
(the blacktop road, for instance) to balance my training and prepare
for northern terrain. I can actually canter on the blacktop (not SLICK
type black top) road that goes throughout my neighborhood...I don't do
it a lot, but the shoes are WONDERFUL, and I feel totally safe 99 and
44/100% of the time. That small % of caution is on really slick pave-
ment....I'd even taken to pulling the inserts out of the back shoes
and sacrificing (tears!) the shoes for even better purchase on muddy,
or possibly slick footing.....this worked for me on the rides I tried
it on...we were experimenting and it worked...if I were to continue 
to do this, I'd probably put a St. Croix Eventer on in behind rather
than sacrifice the Slypner...I just happened to have inventory on hand
and we were trying something new.

It takes practice fitting and pulling the inserts, but worth it if the
result is a good one....I like the product very much.

The ONLY surface that I've experienced that just eats the inserts, is
the Old Dominion Ride...we were told this ahead of time...I did not want
to change my game plan..went prepared with LOTS of inserts, and changed
them at nearly every vet check...this was work..not so sure I'd use
them  on that surface again, HOWEVER, I completed in good order with a
sound horse.(100 Mile Ride-'97).I felt I got the result I wanted.

A major advantage is that when a wearing sole DOES pop off
(and they can) you still have a shoe on the foot!...you can put in an-
other wearing sole at the next vet check or when you get home....the 
shoe is not necessarily ruined, I've found out. AND your horse's foot
has protection.

A lovely person riding a really nice horse (from Maine) at the O.D. '97
had a Mustad come off a bunch of miles into the ride, taking a chunk
of wall with it...she had to pull...don't know the details. Another
person (Fl. rider Carlos Crespo) was using another high-tech specialty
shoe, Sneakers, and did  very well with them, but I believe he had to
have the horse re-set midway throughout the ride...not sure of exact de-
tails, ie: front, rear or all around?

The thing about these specialty shoes, is that you have to carry your
own inventory everywhere. To me, that's o.k., if you are achieving the
result...downtime and pulls are very costly too!

We're taking this year off from competition...catching up on stuff..
horse is fine; going barefoot right now and wearing Easy Boots for some
light riding..(I like that product too). They have a snowwhoe effect in
this sometimes deep Fl. sand! I think that's  cool...that fact really
surprised me.

Hope this info helps.

Deena Meyer
Inverness,Fl.