Picking this up because what I’ve bolded is astonishing.
To recap:
Most safety coordinators have NEVER SEEN the watch list.
WTF is the point of a watch list if it’s not distributed and accessible to safety coordinators and other officials?
These safety committee people aren’t fit for purpose.
We have been totally let down by the people who tell us they’re taking safety seriously.
people who discuss that collection is the the problem have no idea what they are talking about.
Collection has nothing with a not thinking horse.
My humble advice read the principals, 1 and 2.
My humble opinioan 99% of the poster even do not know what the principals are.
We use today 3 forms of collection. Dressage is the highest, Stadium the second and XC the third.
It is hoe you manage those levels.
Collection has nothing to do to make a horse brainless, neither dressage, or unable to think for itself.
That is the dumbest thing I have ever heard, so dumb its just mind boggling.
Idiotic.
We need in every phase of eventing collection, diferent states.
Collection puts the hind quarters of the horse under the gratify point of the horse and lifts is forehand.
How can you jump without it, if the horse does not have its hinds under the gravity point. Impossible.
Just works till N, because they just not high enough, hobble over them, even a cow can do that.
Nothing to it.
But what is the power house of a horse, which propulsi it over a jump. Its the rear end.
What does that mean, to launch, its rear has to be far under the point of its gravity center, if not it will just mowe down the jump
Collection, the horse can not jump without collection, no matter what and Dresage, not flat work, is the key to it.
Again the principles.
the three corner stones are, balance, straightness and OBIDIENCE, once those are established one can work on collection.
Obedience is mostly completely mis understood, it means the horse has to react to my inputs instantly, but it is the riders decision, not the horses.
After that comes collection, which is the corner stone
For those saying the event shouldn’t have gone on, if she died at the hospital, it is entirely possible that a. The event organizers weren’t informed in time to cancel or b. They didn’t want to cancel and therefore risk notification happening for the family, or rumours to be started. The event organizers would not be first in the priority of notification if the death happened in hospital.
Unfortunately, while we have less in the Canadian Army then some other armies, we have deaths during training and deaths during overseas missions. We have a very strict policy that goes into affect the moment it happens, so that family members can be notified appropriately. While it seems callous, most of the competitors may not have known the outcome, and therefore the rumour mill took time to activate. We fight the rumour mill during training by immediately confiscating everyone electronics, and we go on a full comms lock down. While our family members at home may think something has happened, it is one of the only ways to ensure the people who need to be informed compassionately, are. Obviously you can’t take those measures in civilian life. So by continuing the event, there was a better opportunity for the family to be informed.
We had a fatality one year in training. The powers that be chose to continue the training like it was a regular emergency situation for an hour. Why? Because the soldiers wife was also on training and needed to be located. They had to keep it so tightly under wraps that they continued training for an hour. Absolutely heartbreaking. While that soldiers unit stood down, we continued training. When the comms lockdown was lifted, we were informed of the situation.
We can all what if the situation. But I have no doubt that there is a plan in place for the worse case scenario at these events, and the plan is not about money, or the show must go on, but to try and avoid the rumour mill until the family can be notified. I am sure their emergency plan may be different whether the rider is declared dead on the scene or not as well.
The remarks about collection and dressage taking away the horse’s “initiative” came primarily, I think, from a Jimmy Wofford article that has been recirculated of late. Distribute praise and blame to him and/or other posters in this thread accordingly.
I understand this reasoning, but as you noted, you can’t apply closed-site emergency plans to an event that is open to the public. There are so many potential witnesses that likely have cell phones. There would be no way to prevent or slow a “rumour mill” at horse trials.
But all they would know, without the show cancelling and announcing that there was a death, was that there was a very bad accident. Obviously it’s different if the rider died on the scene, but she was taken to hospital. The rumour mill can run, but its without certainity, and all they know is a rider was badly injured.
Sure there is. There always is.
It’s called the truth.
If someone is killed or seriously injured at a competition, the other competitors have the right to know - especially if it’s before it’s their turn to go out on XC.
The officials and volunteers should all be informed.
You can do this and still have sensitivity to the family and privacy issues.
The same is true for a horse death on course - all participants should be informed.
I think the point is that if the event stops everybody wonders why, they piece things together, and the family of the rider possibly learns of the death by text or social media instead of in a proper and compassionate way. If the event goes on people stay busy and have no reason to speculate about why everything stopped.
USEA had an emergency meeting and are discussing MER of dressage and SJ scores before XC is allowed. Also deputizing more people to watch for and report dangerous riding. Not sure how quickly that can be implemented.
https://eventingnation.com/an-update-on-frangible-fundraising-efforts-the-useas-plan-forward/
So Red Hills is about to run. anybody see anything on this entry list or course map and want to say something to somebody?
I understood the point. I just don’t think continuing the event would have prevented speculation regarding such a catastrophic accident in a public place.
From the eventing nation article: One group is working on putting together a list of Minimum Eligibility Requirements (MERs) for the day of the competition, as it’s happening. “If you don’t meet specific standards — whether that is a specific dressage score or a certain amount of rails in the show jumping — maybe potentially that’s not your day,” she says. “Maybe it’s not safe for that horse and rider combination to go on to the cross country.”
Is stadium always run ahead of xc nowadays? Even KM/KO would not have stood out as being particularly awful amongst the Intermediate showjumpers (though weaker in the DR)—https://legacy.evententries.com/livescoring/17288.html
You would have to also get rid of the “greatest climber” award (or whatever it is called for moving up the placings by the greatest amount). Really don’t see how that would not send many safe competitors home before xc.
In my mind, the lack of certainty creates more opportunity for harmful rumours. And, news of a badly injured rider and the death of a horse would be enough for me to accept the cancellation of an event. I recognize others won’t feel the same.
This is stupid. We’ve been here before. Is there no institutional knowledge? In years past, when someone actually ran the numbers the horse that was in 1st place after dressage was statically the most likely horse to have problems and pick up penalties on XC than any other placement after dressage.
Not sure if anyone else has broached… but if eventing culture is being discussed as part of the problem, then how is a “blooper reel” of potentially catastrophic misses being presented with this soundtrack even remotely okay? As a filmmaker and rider, I found the music choice from this video to be extremely inappropriate and frankly, in light of what we are discussing… disturbing.
ETA: I am not an eventer… so perhaps I am off. But the discordance here is troubling. (Thank you, JER for posting. Scary.)
The “thrills and spills” videos, which were what they called them in the past, were even worse back in the day.
Extreme skiing, surfing , etc… all have the same tendency to put their wipeouts to music. Big difference when there is a horse crashing along with the human, isn’t there.
There were definitely issues with this vest, it didn’t go out of production because eventers deliberately ignored an innovative piece of safety equipment. On paper and in theory, it was brilliance.
Actually it was extremely restrictive, it required a second person to help secure it on and get it off. They are exceptionally heavy, and fit was an issue. you need to be able to move on your horse xc, this is why the air vest is wildly popular.
The fact is it wasn’t popular because many riders who tried them, realised they would never comfortably be able to wear them.
Unless the origional issues are changed, I really doubt bringing it back would change the eventual outcome of it the first time around.
But horses ARE capable of collecting as needed, shifting their weight onto their hindquarters, and pushing off the ground from behind on their own. They were doing it out of necessity in the wild before humans even thought of sItting on them. And the hind end engagement they use is a very similar motion to jumping & relies on the same musculature as going up steep hills as they forage or run from predators.
And if a horse is quirky & not especially obedient for dressage, if they’re careful in front & reasonably brave, you can teach them to back off the jumps themselves a good bit. Start with flower boxes(better than a pole bc they jump it a little).
Set a normal canter stride in front of vertical at your warmup height (or trot rail if you prefer). ). Then gradually raise the jump and/or move the boxes in slightly as you progress. Keep the same forward canter/gallop in no matter what, and you’ll find your horse backing off the jump itself and really patting the ground to fit the step in.
Obviously, have an educated ground person to help with the adjustments & decide when you can’t go any closer or higher because .
No, you cannot do that and still respect sensitivity and the family. Notifications take TIME. It’s very easy to put two and two together and figure out who died. Riders right to know that someone died on course does not trump the right of the family to be informed in a compassionate manner.
Would you feel the same if it was a non jump related death? I.e. someone had a heart attack? Or if it was your family member and you found out via social media? It’s the same situation with accident pictures on the news and families finding out because they see a photo of the wreck. I am sorry, but I absolutely disagree that a riders right to know, trump’s the family’s right to be informed. These things take so much time.
On top of that- who at the hospital, where the rider died, is going to call and tell the competition in enough time? Does someone official from the competition go with them? Again, there are rights of the victim and their family.
Oh, I remember them. But IIRC, they were typically set to some pretty adrenaline pumping music that conveyed the seriousness of what was on screen. It’s not that setting wipeouts to music is inherently disturbing (though perhaps it is), it’s that this choice of music is tone deaf.
ETA: You’re right - also far more disturbing when there’s the horse involved!
The Jimmy Wofford article (did you read it?) suggested that with dressage in particular, decisions are mostly being made moment to moment for the horse, by the rider. It did not argue that this makes a “not thinking horse”, but that it gives a different mind-set in which the horse gets cues from the rider and then obeys those cues. Whereas in long-format eventing, the rider would at many times need to get out of the horse’s way and let the horse figure out the jump.
Wofford was certainly not arguing that a horse doesn’t need hindquarters to jump, or any of the other stuff your post argues against.
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