Is anyone else as ashamed of what happened at the WEG Endurance race as I am?

[caffeinated]

I think the biggest issues were the misdirect at the beginning, and then the lateness of cancellation along with failing to get all the competitors on course stopped as soon as the cancellation happened.

There were other problems for sure, but I think those problems are not Tryon’s fault. Arguably the only issue for which Tryon may be wholly responsible is the misdirect at the start. The cancellation is on the FEI officials. The horses in distress is mostly a conditioning/rider awareness issue. I don’t think Tryon or America should be “ashamed” - the facilities were not as finished as they should have been for a competition of this caliber, but given the time frame they had to work with and various circumstances outside of their control (delays earlier this year because of mudslides and other regional issues), I think they’ve pulled most everything off pretty well. I was most worried about the XC portion of eventing and that went off very well.

I do think FEI needs to rework endurance and take a hard look at that, but I don’t think that’s the fault of Tryon or that we as American horse people need be ashamed of that.

[Scribbler]

The link I shared above had 19 horses vetted out in 2014 as compared to 27 this year, and one death on course.

There are also big problems with horse welfare in the middle East desert endurance world and those folks were out in force at the WEG.

[Mardi]

The organizers and FEI do their part and have responsibilities to create a venue that provides an adequate competition facility. On the other side, the horse owners and competitors have their own responsibilities to the horses, who are the primary athletes. Every owner/competitor has the option to withdraw before, or during the competition, if the conditions are below their own acceptable limits. Dressage freestyle was cancelled in part for this very reason- the competitors said NO.

[GraceLikeRain]

@trubandloki

I am confused how riders not preparing for the conditions = the blame rests squarely with the organizers.

The blame rests squarely on the organizers for the misdirect. Showing up with an ill prepared horse is 100% the rider responsibility. My post lacked clarity. Sorry.

[Where_sMyWhite]

@yaya

So how was it going to cost the owners $70 grand? Maybe they couldn’t use the official shippers from where they are?

The cost isn’t a 50/50 split on the transportation costs to/from New Zealand.

New Zealand, being such a ‘closed’ ecosystem, has fairly strict quarantine regulations for horses coming into the country.

Barack Obama was not the first horse over the years to leave New Zealand for a competition and not return back to New Zealand.

As noted, his owners weren’t going to just tie him to a tree and return home.

[Where_sMyWhite]

@Scribbler

The link I shared above had 19 horses vetted out in 2014 as compared to 27 this year, and one death on course.

Who was the death on course?

Barack Obama was the only death I was aware of and he was euthanized at the clinic after being transported and treated there.

[Where_sMyWhite]

@RPM

No, I’m not ashamed or embarrassed, because I had nothing to do with it. Nor do I know anyone who had anything to do with it, so why should I be ashamed or embarrassed? I am in no way affiliated with Tryon, the FEI, or endurance as a sport.

Surprised, yes. Puzzled as to how this could happen. But not ashamed or embarrassed.

This I agree with. I didn’t have anything to do with what happened. There are many emotions I feel but ashamed or embarrassed aren’t on the list.

Could things have been handled better by the organizers, yes. Could things have been handled better by FEI, yes. Could things have been handled better by the competitors, yes.

I hope that there were learnings by all involved as take-aways from this WEG. This is the part I am not convinced will happen as it should as politics often get in the way of learnings and improvement

[caffeinated]

@Where'sMyWhite

Who was the death on course?

Barack Obama was the only death I was aware of and he was euthanized at the clinic after being transported and treated there.

I think scribbler was referring to 2014, not this year.

https://www.horseandhound.co.uk/weg/…n-games-454885 (fwiw, sounds like a freaky accident involving a tree collision and a slip and fall)

[Brown_Derby]

The “holligans” got upset because they were basically robbed because they practiced good horsemanship. They won fair and square.
[SIZE=3]https://www.facebook.com/laliga4sports/videos/401109077089362/

Also, there was a little matter of a woman ignoring the NC DOT signs and driving her Lexus SUV onto the course. She entered from Overmountain Vineyards, which hosted part of the ride and ignored the NC DOT signs. I don’t know if she was drunk or crazy but apparently they could not get her off the course and she was deemed a danger to the horses and herself. I hope that wasn’t you, OP.

That the USEF has forbidden its riders to talk to the press about the race, the limited access for the press (only about 15 of 30 were allowed in), and no photographers allowed at the vet checks…ugh, I WISH I had a tinfoil hat.[/SIZE]

[Scribbler]

@caffeinated

I think scribbler was referring to 2014, not this year.

https://www.horseandhound.co.uk/weg/…n-games-454885 (fwiw, sounds like a freaky accident involving a tree collision and a slip and fall)

Yes, that’s what I meant! The deaths aren’t really comparable, of course. But the high number of vet outs made me think this is a more integral part of the endurance game. If 19 horses failed to pass a jog out in jumping or were rung out as lame in dressage it would be a scandal, but I’m assuming passing or failing the vet checks during an endurance race is seen a bit differently than that?

[Highflyer]

Some horses lose shoes or step on themselves or any of a number of dumb horse things that are enough to knock them out for the day.

[DownYonder]

@GraceLikeRain

The blame rests squarely on the organizers for the misdirect. Showing up with an ill prepared horse is 100% the rider responsibility. My post lacked clarity. Sorry.

I thought I saw somewhere that it was an FEI official that caused the misdirect. Has it been confirmed that it was someone on the organizing staff?

[Laurierace]

https://medium.com/@anvidiz/diary-of-a-fiasco-f1d74d1914e9

[Scribbler]

@tabula rashah

Yes, it’s very different. A lot of the failed vet checks are because the horse didn’t come down to the required pulse. I don’t know what parameters are in place for FEI but for AERC rides it’s is usually 64 (you have 30 mins to achieve this but less time it takes for recovery the better). They are also judged much more thoroughly and harshly as far as vetting- here’s a link for an AERC vet card https://aerc.org/static/upload/RiderCard.pdf.

Thank you, yes as I thought. Passing the vet check is part of the competition strategy, I expect you push as fast as you can while keeping within the parameters and if you misjudge you are out. More like going too fast in jumpers and knocking down a rail than a soundness DQ in an arena class. So having 27 rather than 19 vet outs shows the conditions were tougher, but that’s not like having 27 DQ in a competition where there is usually no DQ.

[GraceLikeRain]

@Laurierace

https://medium.com/@anvidiz/diary-of-a-fiasco-f1d74d1914e9

Super interesting. The blogger says that at 6:45 they passed the original start line from where they were redirected and were told that another group was 40 minutes ahead of them. How did 54 horses manage to start the race at 6:05 when horses were not allowed to leave the stable until 6:00 and the race start line was 15 minutes from the stable?

[tabula_rashah]

@Scribbler yes that’s a pretty good comparison. Just for an example, this spring I took my mare to a 30 mile LD in the mountains in VA. It was super cold (weird, weird spring this year for the mid-Atlantic) and I didn’t do any type of clip on my mare before the race (it’s common to at least trace clip esp with winter coat still sort of there). The ride was a whole loop (ie you started at base camp and finished at base camp but the vet checks were out along the trail). My first check was at 22 miles- my mare felt fantastic the whole ride although she was being a bit of an arse- pulling my arms out and wanting to go to fast. When I got into the check, I couldn’t get her pulse down past 68 so we were pulled. There was nothing really wrong with her- she was bright, alert and full of the dickens still but we got a trailer ride back to camp and were see by a treatment vet anyway just to make sure. Basically it came down to me making the wrong call about clipping, her being a monkey on trail and me not giving quite the right balance of electrolytes for the day.

[poltroon]

@tabula rashah

@Scribbler yes that’s a pretty good comparison. Just for an example, this spring I took my mare to a 30 mile LD in the mountains in VA. It was super cold (weird, weird spring this year for the mid-Atlantic) and I didn’t do any type of clip on my mare before the race (it’s common to at least trace clip esp with winter coat still sort of there). The ride was a whole loop (ie you started at base camp and finished at base camp but the vet checks were out along the trail). My first check was at 22 miles- my mare felt fantastic the whole ride although she was being a bit of an arse- pulling my arms out and wanting to go to fast. When I got into the check, I couldn’t get her pulse down past 68 so we were pulled. There was nothing really wrong with her- she was bright, alert and full of the dickens still but we got a trailer ride back to camp and were see by a treatment vet anyway just to make sure. Basically it came down to me making the wrong call about clipping, her being a monkey on trail and me not giving quite the right balance of electrolytes for the day.

Which is exactly how you want the vetting to work - to pull the horses when they are still bright and fine and getting pulled from the race is all they need as far as treatment.

[tabula_rashah]

@poltroon

Which is exactly how you want the vetting to work - to pull the horses when they are still bright and fine and getting pulled from the race is all they need as far as treatment.

Yep- and even if I’d been able to get her down, I’d have pulled her myself because taking that long to pulse down is not normal for her at all and I’d rather err a million times to the side of caution than hurt her

[SnicklefritzG]

WEG has been a huge embarassment. Riders being sent off in the wrong direction? That should NEVER happen.

[poltroon]

This, from the Medium post linked, sums up my confusion:

If the horse’s death tell us something is that FEI made a lot of mistakes when planning the ride and when decided not to cancel it after the 1st loop (the horse died, after all!). Canceling the ride on the 4th loop neither protected the horses that weren’t fit to it (almost all of them had already been eliminated on the 3rd vet) nor respected the riders who had overcome so many challenges and were in the edge of conquering such an important result.