Thought we were talking about performance use. As in, I have not seen a plain old polo wrap used in any form of upper level competition. Flatting or hacking or whatever, idk. I am not in these UL pro’s barns so idk what they use for day to day stuff. But I have volunteered at plenty of events and stood ringside at enough AA HJ shows to know that a majority of those horses coursing 1.20m+ aren’t walking into the ring in polo wraps.
Nope, people are allowed to have ignorant, blatantly nonfactual opinions all they want. Most times, I call those people crazy!
FYI, before anyone gets defensive, I am not commenting on your opinion on boots or polos or whatever but rather on your statement that opinions don’t have to be facts. I would rethink that comment. Do you really want to be THAT person that is proud that their opinions are nonfactual?
This just makes me think of flat earthers and anti-vaccine supports. :lol:
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The swelling wouldn’t be there in a horse that has 12 hours of turnout daily, therefore just movement alone isn’t going to cut it.
On the contrary, that would show that “movement alone IS going to cut it”. Movement is the biggest difference between turnout and stalled.
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I can see this point, actually, and thank you for bringing it up.
Like I mentioned earlier - I would be very curious to see the difference with and without warps on particular horses. I know in my experience swelling goes down either way, but I also live in mild winter climates and sweltering summer climates, so all of you is sweating 300 or more days a year anyhow.
Once again, please drop the conversation. Clearly you want to think you are 100% correct. Pick on somebody that asked to be picked on. You are welcome to stereotype people how you choose before you really get to know them, but to judge someone because they made an opinion you don’t like is rude. Go be THAT person.
That makes no sense?!? My horse is currently out during the day. I ride him mid day and then turn him back out so he was moving around prior to riding. He is turned out in a large herd so I know he’s out there running around a lot.
Sometimes when I’m lazy and just doing a light hack, i’ll just use bell boots. Otherwise when at home i use my BOT brush boots on the front and bell boots.
At shows, I use my equifit open fronts, bells, and hind performance boots.
My boy always has to have bells, or will pull a shoe.
I can promise you no one is picking on you, moreso trying to understand why you want an opinion that is not factual… That just seems naive and like you really don’t care about your horse’s longterm wellbeing when presented with facts.
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This isn’t a right or wrong, correct or incorrect situation. There is very much a grey area. In fact, most of life is grey area. I’m not sure what “stereotype” you’re referring to but I will let you be.
I don’t think anyone was talking about performance use. This is a hunter and jumper forum. Every hunter is going into the ring with naked legs.
If you’ve stood near the gate at any of the hunter rings you would probably have noticed that a lot of hunters warm up with plain old polos, simply as a way to keep legs clean before going in the ring.
There is a big difference between listening and understanding and y’all aren’t making a huge effort to understand. If something was abusive to a horse, it wouldn’t be on the market and widely used whether it’s used in your discipline or not. My horses performance is affected more by saddle fit and nutrition rather than the boots he is wearing and that goes for all horses.
I understand that in the hunter ring, y’all use no boots. That’s what your discipline attire is. (Not even going to go there with the useless and horrible standing martingale) Hunter horses are supposed to be careful and neat over the jump and not lazy. I’m not saying event horses aren’t careful and lazy, but they aren’t trained to look pretty and neat, rather to be brave and get over it. We don’t focus on form. If their legs hit a solid obstacle, well you better hope nothing penetrated the skin. In eventing, we use boots 90% of the time and like stated above, I don’t use polo wraps for performance use, only in training. As for the SMBs, they provide protection from interference and concussion. In training, I only jump about 1-2 times a month at most 4(1x week).I use them about once a month at the one event I go to every month. Yes, I take them off once I get back to my trailer and my horse gets hosed/sponged off. Sometimes he gets poultice wraps and sometimes BOT quick wraps.
Now currently, my horse has a suspensory injury from a growing splint, which I can assure you is not from his boots or polos. I have a vets knowledge alongside me. I’m glad I’ve been polo wrapping my horse and booting him so that any interference wouldn’t make it worse than it currently is. Simple splint and brush boots, especially those that don’t have sheepskin are hard to fit to a horses leg with a large splint.
The vid is from a program called Inside Nature’s Giants that dissected various large animals. Wasn’t trying to sell anything.
Iirc the horse was a young TB who had been pts due to an injury.
Cool, I’ve seen that program, and you are right, not selling anything, although they were all about the amazing biomechanical design and fragility of the horse, so maybe accuracy a little overstated for effect. But still, I think the point stands. This is not the typical, common or likely outcome for a horse at high speed.
After listening to this podcast I’ve discarded all my polo wraps and started being more diligent about using appropriate boots when riding the flat and jumping. This podcast is an equine veterinarian who shows hunters and jumpers so I have more confidence in her opinion than I do in others.
http://springhillequine.libsyn.com/s1e14-the-breakdown-on-boots
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No one is talking about performance use?! Did you read the thread at all? Page 2 and 3 discusses plenty of performance use. As you said. This is a hunter AND JUMPER forum. I ride jumpers. Most jumpers are NOT going into the ring with naked legs. As was made evident in my comment when I mentioned 1.20 jumpers, I wasn’t talking about hunters. Hunter classes aren’t measured in meters. If you want to talk about hunters, that is a whole different discussion.
We have run the gamut in this thread talking about hunters, jumpers, eventers and so on. So idk why you are only bringing up hunters like that was all we were talking about?
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I never use boots.
Pepper and I competed every weekend including dressage, showjumping and cross county and ridden most days of the week, including galloping around a State Forest. He was ridden sound by me from 7 yo to into is early 30s.
I have been to told to boot for lunging as they can hit themselves when being silly. I use the lunge to work them. I do not let them be silly during lunging. So I lunge daily without boots. I see it as no different from them being ridden.
I do not use boots except for showing and occasionally when jumping at home. My view is that the increase in heat and subsequent cell death is not worth the protection from interference that isn’t very likely to happen while flatting anyway. Yes the risk of injury is higher when jumping, but I pretty much let her go naked outside of grid/ shows/ new exercises.
The study about the increased heat and cell death is incredibly fascinating. It’s posted somewhere on the forums.
I also only use NON neoprene boots with “vents” (don’t know how well vented they actually are) such as the Majyk Equip open fronts. I’ve also been advised to only use boots with wide straps secured by velcro to avoid pressure points from thin straps across the front of the cannon bones and ensure a more secure fit (the stud hook closures only offer 3 settings).
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Yes I read the entire thread. My point was that many posters were discussing how they boot at home and in warm up, so there’s no need to get hung up on “performance”. I mentioned hunters because many of them warm up in polos at a show, even though they go in the ring with naked legs.
I’m really not sure why you’re getting so upset about this thread. There are many different boots or wraps to put on a horse. Many of them have a place in different scenarios.
I think being cooped up is making everyone a little testy :lol:
I’m ambivalent about boots. Some horses need them - my mare really needed boots behind because she paddled and would beat herself up if I didn’t have a hard boot on her behind. I used eskadrons on her all the time. She also wore boots in front (the - GASP - crappy neoprene ones! The horror!!) and wore Davis bell boots to jump. I couldn’t use the regular rubber bell boots on her because she would rip through them after about 3 jumps.
I’ve had animals who never used boots and some who only wore bell boots. Varies by the horse.
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Takes two
