This struck home. I just texted my trainer and quoted this and said I wanted to start focusing on this with my wiggle worm.
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My deepest condolences to all who knew and loved Katharine Morel and Kerry ON. Particularly for her family and coach. This is just earth shattering for them, I can only imagine.
Over last day or so, I’ve been reading posts here, and agree with many comments. The ones I don’t, I just skim…
I write the following to put my opinion in perspective of my life horse experience as an eventing mom up to Training level, and low level eventer/fox hunter myself. I started off young with a former French Cavalry officer. Punishment for bad riding was to lose your stirrups, even on CC.
I have had consistent coaching and taken many clinics with pros in areas of eventing, dressage, and show jumping over the years. Throw in some volunteer jump judging at recognized events into the mix. I’ve put considerable effort into improving my riding and keeping myself and my horses safe.
To me, safety is being in balance with your horse at all times.
There are sadly many train wrecks waiting to happen at most events, and that is too sad for poor horse and young rider IMHO. But by the time they are at an event, too many things have already gone wrong.
I think the only way to fix this problem and save this sport is a systemic change, with many good ideas posted here and elsewhere from people with different perspectives.
As others have written, it starts by conducting a proper analysis, and public reporting, of what happened last weekend. I think that the young athletes who are competing today deserve this.
One last point, I’m hoping that pros taking selfies from their hospital beds following serious falls is something of the past. There are inherent risks with the sport, but I think this behaviour sends the wrong message to younger riders, which is that accidents are okay.
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My thoughts on the suggestions of a judged XC round, I don’t think it has a place in eventing. With dressage being the subjective part already, it has already become a mess with flags being subjective. I just don’t think it would work.
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@Wilbury Pie I completely agree with you about the hospital bed selfies. The idea that being injured or almost killed is funny is concerning especially this age with the power of sical media.
Speaking of social media, Canadian Olympian Kelly Plitz just posted this on her FB. As someone who has seen hundreds of riders start from the bottom and work their way up, I would be confident to say she would be well educated in the subject. What she says is so true and very true here in Ontario as I mentioned before where we have a strong culture of upgrading and upgrade brag rights.
Just some thoughts from an old Cowgirl…
I read an article about 6 young women who were tragically killed while Eventing
A link of age and level of competition was drawn.
What I came away with was these are all dedicated young women who are ambitious and are competing with their “best friend” the horse that they have developed and brought up through the levels and they totally trust one another so what could go wrong. I was one of these young women 40 years ago in my 20’s.
My horse was eager and very scopey I only moved up because I was recommended to do from people in the sport I respected.
Not that I didn’t make stupid mistakes but I was lucky through any of the falls that me and my horse endured.
However I was on a very scopey horse.
I can’t say for sure but some of these young women love their horses so much and feel this is reciprocated so of course they feel they can jump up through the levels and reach that pinnacle “5 ring prize” through love and hard work when their horse lacks the ability to compete at the higher levels. However the fact that both horse and rider are so trusting of one another they continue to progress from Prelim to Intermediate. (Most horses and riders can go prelim but intermediate seems to be where the whey settles and the cream rises to the top so to speak.
Intermediate on paper seems like an easy step but the speed required and the larger dimensions and closer related distances of the obstacles all factor in to cause a perfect storm in the right recipe of ambitious rider on a trusted best friend of a mount and the horse who has no reason to doubt his rider because they have always been successful up through Preliminary but now added speed size and complicated combinations have upped the stakes and the horse has no idea the course is now bigger then the last one. Hopefully there has been some preparation of schooling prior to moving up.
We will never make this sport risk free but maybe we can for see some patterns that can lead to disaster and as coaches try to temper our students who are more ambitious then the horses they ride. This is a sophisticated sport at the higher levels and just because you love your horse and he “loves” you does not make you a team that is ready to take on the world.
This is just my humble observation from “a been there done that” Eventer now Reining and having so much fun.
Kelly Plitz
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I know one case in my hood where the rider went after the organisation after his horse died on a fence that was not properly secured. It ended up in a big mess and I believe the course designer and TD were the ones to blame according to the court. The event - a smaller national one - never come back on the calendar after this.
In all I’ve been asking the same question for years and I believe plenty of officials and organisations should be pretty happy no one has yet gone to court for suing them after horses died and riders got injured…
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Now, now. I don’t think you make more than a straw man argument if you don’t take “ride like a hunter” to mean the best of what that discipline and set of training goals has to offer, rather than the caricatured worst of what you can see in the show ring.
There is nothing wrong for any horseman with valuing balance; a horse who responds to a half-halt (at any speed); a rider who is accurate; a horse who does know that he’s got to find his own way over the fence a bit; a rider with equitation that is effective yet minimalist and least-disruptive to the horse, a flying change being considered basic equipment that that every horse has the opportunity to meet a fence in balance.
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But you have a point: If the rather non-technical emphasis on guts-and-grit worked when XC meant a much less-technical course, then the culture has to change in order to start to value basics and rideability for these modern courses. And are those changing because we are running out of land for those longer courses?
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Don’t get me wrong, I like a good hunter round and there is something to be said for a course and a horse that is ridden quietly and effectively. :yes:
But the riding style you need to get a horse over an Intermediate table is not the same as what you need to get a Hunter over a H/J fence. Especially not considering what is after or before that table: a combination, drop, ditch, whatever. You have to have different rhythm, different paces, different balance for each type of fence you encounter on XC. Not the same as H/J, where you are supposed to approach each fence at the same rhythm, regardless of where it is on course. You cannot do that in an Intermediate course and make the time. There are some fences you need to take at a gallop and some fences you slow way down to a “SJ canter” for.
This is before even getting into the riding position[s] common in H/J - I’m purely talking about the horse.
You can have a ratable, ridable horse and an accurate round at Intermediate and it still would never look like a H/J round. I don’t personally think the two sports compare, having been in both worlds - different horses, different courses.
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Locke Meadows. The 1st video you posted is of a rider who was an alternate for the US team for the 2016 Olympics. She was riding a mustang. Do with this what you will.
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Yup. I think what makes the American System of training and equitation great isn’t about position so much as the value placed on the minimalist ride. That will look really different XC, but also for a great jockey on a race horse and also someone trying to keep out of his cutting horse’s way. I think this is a basic, “less is more” style of horsemanship that should be cherished everywhere.
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OK, but why does a mustang that can’t jump safely need to be asked to do that at an event?
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I am flabbergasted!!! Where were the officials?
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I’m still concerned why no one said anything about her vest too. At events in Canada they are supposed to check your vest. The vest is too small and the space between the laces is way too large. There should be no space.
Im also wondering if riders are fit enough. Having been a fitness journey myself the change from doing 3 months of work and training has made a HUGE difference in my riding. I don’t know if enough riders take their fitness seriously, which to event at that level you have to be insanely fit.
My horse spook spun on me the other day and what would have been a fall, wasn’t because my core is so much stronger I just swung my leg back and held on and pulled myself up no problem. It amazed me and realized this was a huge element I have been missing for 15 years, and I wasn’t exactly unfit before this, just increased my fitness a lot.
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A couple of people here have posted that the riding in the Rebecca Farm video looks “OK.” NO. IT. DOES. NOT. Right out of the start box, she is bouncing on her horses back, actually sitting the gallop - not up and balanced off her horse’s back. In racing, you don’t see jockeys sitting down in the tack until they reach the last turn - sitting in the tack signals to the horse to GO!!! No wonder that mare is racing. She balances on that mare’s mouth the entire ride, has no control, pulling and chugging on her mouth, running into the long grass and vying not to retire there and then. I cannot believe anybody thought it was OK for this pair to even be at Training level, much less Intermediate. I am sorry for all involved I really am.
As far as prevention - I think the only way for people to be protected from themselves is for some kind of system to be put in place that requires inexperienced/amateur riders who want to move up to the ULs to get checked off by some kind of licensed officials. Obviously, this current system - that allows pairs to move up based on four (last time I checked) “qualifying rides” - is not working.
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Except by the time we have the investigation, the horse and rider are already dead.
Kat Morel could have been saved by a reality check. Who cares where it comes from?
If someone is approaching an explosive device and they’ve neglected to put on their protective clothing, do we worry about hurting their feelings when we yell ‘Hey! Put your safety gear on!”?
No, of course not.
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This is excellent.
Can we all sign on to LadyB’s pledge?
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She normally jumps way better than that.
I think your question is rhetorical, but… obviously, it doesn’t. That mare was overfaced due to ego.
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Brad, we need voices like yours. An outsider perspective but one who knows just how much this sport can create a world of hurt.
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That wasn’t a good round for her. I think prelim was a bit too much for her, Elisa dropped her back down to training after one more Prelim run (probably just to make sure it wasn’t a fluke since she was clear her first prelim before the one in that video). I don’t think I would say that she doesn’t jump safely. And honestly she probably would have been able to do it with a bit more work, but I think Elisa had to focus on the client horses/bigger horses more so the personal ones became more to play with. It’s not like Hwin had anything else to prove, she is pretty incredible.
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