How interesting. He doesn’t appear to be refusing the next jump except once, he appears to have a problem on landing.
I’d be curious to see more rounds. But there’s something triggering it - could be pain in the fronts somewhere, or could be when people jump up his neck. This looks more physical than eye-related to me now that I’ve seen more videos.
And that definitely doesn’t justify her behavior, how embarrassing for Chad.
The horse clearly found a method that works to eject his passenger.
I see beating it is really working to fix the problem.
This, over and over.
Would be nice if owners found horses no longer able to do their intended job a safe place to land instead of unloading them on unsuspecting new owners. I get people want to recoup money but sometimes you just have to call it a loss and do what’s right.
Sure, if the “job” is “being ridden”. Plenty of horses just don’t work out for the rider’s plans and can be happily moved along to a different career. Maybe it’s dressage, maybe it’s competitive trail, maybe it’s w/t lessons at a college.
Selling a horse because it doesn’t like the job is fine - especially if a general soundness workup has been done to ensure that it really IS just the horse not wanting to play in that space. I don’t think people should be required to retire their event prospect because it flat out HATES xc…
I do agree that it isn’t ethical to sell your lame and fried horse on without doing your due diligence and being VERY honest with the prospective new owners. I also think it’s unethical to sell your aged horse that no one will want to care for like you would. But that’s different than a horse just not being a fit for your discipline.
My experience has been that sometimes people do disclose, but they don’t exactly know what they are disclosing.
And sometimes new owners insist on buying a horse they really shouldn’t because it’s in their budget.
And sometimes trainers take horses on that they think they can fix, and they really can’t.
I’ve been involved in one of these crazy transactions with a troubled horse, and things get wild really fast. In my case, I was just a friend who somehow ended up involved and the horse ended up in my barn for the grand old price of $1 after things deteriorated to the point the horse didn’t even want to be ridden anymore.
What was the problem? In this case, it was a small issue (perhaps physical, not sure because he passed the PPE, but as you well know that can be complicated) which turned into a very large one when the trainer (not me) decided that galloping the horse in deep sand would “fix” his formerly minor balking issue. This caused a bilateral hind suspensory issue that was also non-obvious and then the horse’s attitude turned to absolute poo (for good reason) and his minor balking issue became a major “let’s dump the rider” issue.
In this horse’s case, the fault really lay with the new owners who insisted on buying a horse that was outside of their skill level because he was a “cheap warmblood”. It also lay with the trainer, who told them she could fix them after they purchased him. I felt terrible for the horse, whose fault it definitely wasn’t. I suppose the original owner should have known that something might have been wrong, but she did disclose all of his behaviors and new owner just…glossed over all of it.
the Black Stallion syndrome? If you just love the horse enough you can ride him!
In this particular horse’s case, it was partially that but in no small part the new owner was a well-meaning but clueless parent whose daughter really wanted a warmblood like “all the other girls”. Well-meaning but clueless parent didn’t have the budget for a warmblood who could do the things, so decided purchasing a “budget-friendly” warmblood was a good idea. Her desire to make her kid happy ended up causing a major issue. She pretty much badgered her trainer into buying that horse.
It was a huge lesson for me, but I was in my early 20s and had NO idea things could go so far sideways with a horse - it was pre-COTH and a very long time ago lol. I had ridden the horse and he wasn’t terrible nor dangerous at that particular juncture. I rode him a few times after trainer got involved (long weird story) and felt him degenerating.
I’m not saying I could have fixed him at that age either - don’t get me wrong, but her fix was definitely not the fix that he needed.
Would he have been different under a different rider/trainer? Hard to tell. He might have gotten worse and diagnostics might have been performed instead of assuming it was a training issue. He might have gotten better and the final physical issue never occurred. It may have simply been that he needed a more precise ride, and kid was not going to be it without a LOT of lessons. Lots of “coulda woulda shouldas” in hindsight.
He was an interesting lesson in both “don’t buy a problem” and “no good deed goes unpunished”. He was very sweet, just had a passel of issues and needed a good handler, trainer and rider.
That poor horse. I’d imagine his front feet are SCREAMING. How does Chad tie into all this? I always understood him to be a consummate horseman. I hope I am not wrong.
I believe he is the one who shared those other clips to somewhat justify her actions?
They are friends and business partners.
He has been the on defending her on multiple posts.
You thought Chad Keenum was a horseman?
I’m incredulous.
Chad who has been set down for drugging horses multiple times?
That’s really disappointing.
I bet they are! Possible navicular changes?
I brought up the poor equitation because this person is a “pro”, and riding horses badly frequently results in a horse showing poorly.
The poor record in the show (it was Final Chase, I was incorrect) I think is relevant, because having a poor showing on her customer’s horses and falling off one of them was likely to be stressful and embarrassing, and may have contributed to the explosive anger that she took out on the horse.
That poor little horse being beaten about the head in the video, placed 3rd out of 7 in his hack class.
That was the best placing for all the owners horses in the show.
As the owner of the sweetest, easiest mare that has a human made quirk over fences, several things come to mind.
This is why my mare is in her forever home with me. She doesn’t deserve this kind of abuse from anyone. (seller was 100% honest about my horse. I knew exactly what I was getting.)
If any trainer ever did this to my horse, trainer would be fired before they got out of the ring. If present, I would be sprinting into the ring to get my horse. And would be tempted to beat said trainer with a crop a few times for good measure.
I have won a decent amount with my mare but have also fallen off more than my fair share. But I get up, walk my horse out of the ring, get back on and we try again. Her stop is due to bad riding in her past. We know this and if I make an amateur mistake, well that’s on me.
Beating this horse is not going to fix the problem. At some point, someone has to take a hard look in the mirror and decide to do what’s best for this horse.
I’ll be forever grateful to the trainer that did the right thing for my mare.
Has anyone else noticed an uptick of anonymous posters advertising ‘talented’ warmbloods for sale on facebook that have quirks for low $? The posters always say that they have the potential to do great things with the right rider/right situation, but I wonder how many of those horses are just burnt out, painful show horses that need a step down job or retirement. With the astronomical price of show horses these days, I can’t blame a young pro or scrappy ammie for wanting to put in the time and work to try and bring a quirky horse around, but it seems likely that many of these sellers are doing their horses a disservice if they end up in the hands of trainers like Marieke. That horse has paid his dues- just look at his USEF record where is his showing back to back for 5-8 months in the years prior to covid. I can only hope he gets a peaceful retirement or quiet step down job.
I didn’t know any of this! Another one off my list…
YUP!!! This is a giant red flag to me 
. It reads as someone trying to unload a problem horse (who might be well known by those around them to be a problem) and they don’t want the general public to be aware, which is why they are doing it anonymously. I don’t think anonymous sale posts should be allowed. If you are advertising a horse for sale you should be willing to attach your name and reputation to it.
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