Maryland 5*

[Blugal]

@Mack_the_Knife

award penalties when needed (two DRs given at Maryland)

I see that Ariel Grald got one in the 3*. I don’t see a second one?

[Mack_the_Knife]

Two recorded warnings for pressing a tired horse both in the 3*. Ariel and Caitlin O’Rourke

[Baybear]

Didn’t watch the live feed but read they removed quite a few jumps from the course. Seems like a lot of riders also chalked up over 100 penalty points. Happy Boyd and Federman had a good trip and withdrew his 2nd horse. I’m also amazed at the number of British riders who have 5* horses.

[Blugal]

I only searched the results - Ariel is recorded as 25 penalties for dangerous riding. Caitlin was eliminated, so in the results that’s all that’s showing.

It’s the FEI warning cards list that shows a Recorded Warning for both riders,

[anonevent]

I’ll add this to my conspiracy theory about courses designed to sabotage OTTBs.

[Jealoushe]

?? can you elaborate on this?

Two TBs finished out of 8 finishers at Maryland.

[blue_heron]

Sorry, what? TBs are the backbone of eventing in North America. They eat up the cross country and lots of them are competing at the top of the sport. Riders and spectators love them.

If anything they are losing in the dressage.

[anonevent]

Sorry. To clarify, that was tongue in cheek. It’s not a conspiracy theory.

Obviously, a jump or xc course with turns primarily (or exclusively) in one direction will handicap horses who had prior careers where their brain and body were extensively trained to turn, almost exclusively, in the opposite direction. That’s not a fair playing field. Two thoroughbred horses having made it to jumping doesn’t mean that the jump course was equally fair to OTTBs. Only one of those horses is OTT anyway.

[blue_heron]

And later in the course there were combinations where you were required to turn left.

The sport is not about fairness. It’s about good riding and training and some luck. If it rains in the middle of xc day and you’re last to go and have to run in the mud, was it not fair? Should they have made the jumps smaller for Teddy O’Connor?

[EventerAJ]

@anonevent

Obviously, a jump or xc course with turns primarily (or exclusively) in one direction will handicap horses who had prior careers where their brain and body were extensively trained to turn, almost exclusively, in the opposite direction. That’s not a fair playing field. Two thoroughbred horses having made it to jumping doesn’t mean that the jump course was equally fair to OTTBs. Only one of those horses is OTT anyway.

This is rather silly. By the time an OTTB reaches FEI level, they should not be “handicapped” by one sidedness or a turning preference. There are plenty of TBs who prefer to go right.

[anonevent]

Multiple false equivalencies at work there!

[blue_heron]

What a strange thing to say. No part of me believes that course designers and the teams that run upper level events are trying to prevent OTTBs from being successful at the top level of the sport. There’s no motive there.

[beowulf]

I understand your sentiment but have not found that their previous career has jeopardized their success as eventers in that capacity. There are other ways I think racing does no favor to TBs restarted as eventers, but that is not one of them.

Both my current eventing TBs (31 starts, 78 starts) are better going to the right.

[BWP]

It would also only impact TBs trained and raced in North America. Nowhere else to my knowledge only races in one direction.

[M1ssmouse]

9 jumps were taken out, weather was a disaster

[Texarkana]

@anonevent

Sorry. To clarify, that was tongue in cheek. It’s not a conspiracy theory.

Obviously, a jump or xc course with turns primarily (or exclusively) in one direction will handicap horses who had prior careers where their brain and body were extensively trained to turn, almost exclusively, in the opposite direction. That’s not a fair playing field. Two thoroughbred horses having made it to jumping doesn’t mean that the jump course was equally fair to OTTBs. Only one of those horses is OTT anyway.

I don’t think this was a factor at all.

I think the bigger problem was they were big and kind of hard to read in my layperson opinion. Like, I didn’t even appreciate them as fences at first.

[Scaramouch]

Maybe but OTTBs have lost the advantage they had over long, gallopy 20th century xc courses. This ship has sailed and of course there are individual TBs that manage very well at the upper levels but the promulgation of “accuracy” questions - tight, the often indirect related distances incorporating terrain with not much margin for error (skinnies) - was certainly not intended to make the sport easier for a breed that’s been developed to gallop flat and low in front.

[StormyDay]

@anonevent

Sorry. To clarify, that was tongue in cheek. It’s not a conspiracy theory.

Obviously, a jump or xc course with turns primarily (or exclusively) in one direction will handicap horses who had prior careers where their brain and body were extensively trained to turn, almost exclusively, in the opposite direction. That’s not a fair playing field. Two thoroughbred horses having made it to jumping doesn’t mean that the jump course was equally fair to OTTBs. Only one of those horses is OTT anyway.

Almost the entire Maryland 5* is going to the left. There are two complexes that switch directions, but almost the whole course is going left.

[Jealoushe]

I always feel like a weirdo because ALL my TBs were better to the right when I got them!

[blue_heron]

That really doesn’t change the fact that much of the modern WB has been developed from TB and TB are still a crucial part of breeding sporthorses especially in eventing to add stamina and lightness. Technical courses require rideable horses with great work ethic, which is a trait I attribute to TB and not your plain old style WB.

I just don’t think that the technical asks of newer cross country horses are part of a greater conspiracy to keep TB out of the sport.