I agree with all of these suggestions. In fact, regarding the first, what if the riding portion came first and a fall meant elimination from the entire competition? That alone would be a big incentive to put more effort into training at riding. I really do think that, and lowering the jumps to a more ammie-friendly height, would make a night-and-day difference. (And, as others have said, enable every rider to have a fresh mount, by increasing the pool of horses.)
@JER Dumb questions, but I noticed that the first versions of the Modern Pentathlon involved soldiers using their own mounts. When did the unfamiliar horse thing get introduced, and how long have the jumps been this high at the top level of the sport?
So as this was beginning to blow up I went over to Annika Schleu’s facebook page. Of course, whatever benign post from about two weeks prior was flooded with comments in several languages about her riding, the pentathlon and accusations about her character. This went on for days. In an age where social media is virtually an integral part of an Olympic athlete’s “brand,” I found it very strange that someone, anyone, even Annika herself, didn’t take down her page or at least make it private. She finally did so today or yesterday. No photos of her riding, no photos of horses, nothing more recent than 2017, and it’s private. Had she had some PR advice, she would have made some sort of apologetic statement, or a statement of any kind. I’m not aware that she has done so. To me, just an example of how MP has been shoved into the deep end and the water is really cold.
I have indeed raced the 200 Free, although as more of a distance swimmer, I prefer the 1500 or the 1000. 200 Butterfly is not something I could do with any amount of speed. However, rotator cuff injuries and a bad riding accident have kept me out of the pool so I wouldn’t want to do it today.
Riding a 1.2m course on a horse I didn’t know would also not be on my top 10 list of things to try at the Olympics.
There are those, even those who love the sport of eventing, who are basically saying this. At the upper levels, too many rotational falls.
That was the point Denny Emerson was trying to make. How many horse and rider deaths are too many? Maybe the cross-country phase of upper-level Eventing needs to be, not eliminated, but simplified, so we are asking less of the horses?
But what he missed is that it was by the sheer grace of God that there wasn’t a horse death or serious injury in the equestrian phase of the Women’s Modern Pentathlon. Have enough horses jumping from terribly short or long spots or just plain crashing through fences instead of going over them, and sooner or later there WILL be a serious horse injury. There are dangerous consequences to overfacing horses and riders.
It’s possible to be concerned with two problems at once. And at least the Eventing community has shown some concern about rotational falls, hence the increased use of frangible pins and flagging riders for dangerous riding. It may not be enough, but it seems to be more than what the Modern Pentathlon community has been doing until now.
I agree with you. I only raced the 200m a few times for that reason and then switched to the longer distances, which suit my swimming abilities better. It’s very hard to pace yourself at 200m – it tends to look more like a sprint.
I actually feel bad for the folks caught up in this social media poop storm at this point… it’s gotten really wild and crazy, and brought all sorts of wingnuts out.
Whoever is running World Pentathlon’s social media (they have a FB and Twitter account) is COMPLETELY inept. The post about the horse has brought out so many nutty responses. Other posts about Pentathlon in general have hundreds of comments…
And then there is the fact that they clearly have tried to hide footage of all the riding, by pulling it from NBC.
They need to make a plan with respect to rule and officiating changes, announce it, then have someone who is actually GOOD with or, and generally likeable, do a few interviews to discuss the reform plan, and talk about the history of the sport, and how they want to embrace horsemanship, safety, and compassion for the animals.
Basically… a little PR 101. From what we are all seeing though, and what has been shared about leadership of this small sport… the folks in charge of the governing body sound like they AREN’T inclined to roll out a smooth and smart PR strategy in response to some of the outcry.
Please note… I’m not saying they shouldn’t sincerely address the obvious equine and athlete welfare and safety issues, etc. I’m just saying that right now, the PR disaster is so stunning for such a small sport… they really need to do something to deal with it more effectively. Even just announcing they are partnering with experts from the FEI to review all rules, policies, and officiating guidelines would be an easy and good step.
I think Denny’s posts were some interesting food for thought though. Here we are, claiming the jumps are simply too high for the MP people… yet look at what happens on cross country entirely too frequently at the upper levels. So much of the discussion revolves around technical ways to make the jumps safer, etc etc…
But maybe this is a good time to pause, and think harder about more possibilities for improving horse and rider safety, and what can be done to help with a culture change in the sport, so that we actually see a result in terms of safety (not just fewer falls, but also fewer injuries…)
If they only make one change to the pentathalon rules, it needs to be elimination on the first fall of the horse, and the horse is out of the competition after one fall.
If the UIMP is not willing to make that rule, then equestrian needs to be removed from pentathalon.
The falls may be the same, but they are caused by two entirely different problems, though. In the Cross country phase of Three-Day Event, I think a lot of the problem is not the height of the fences, but the fact that they pose tricky technical questions which must be addressed at speed. While with Modern Pentathlon, the fences aren’t unusually tricky from the standpoint of a show-jumping course. Too many of the pentathlon riders just aren’t ready to be jumping 4 feet. (And I don’t think that’s entirely an accident: 3’ 6" is about the point where a rider who wishes to advance needs to move on from schoolies and own/lease their own horse. Back when I was riding seriously I topped out at 3’ 3" precisely because the lesson horses I was riding at my barn couldn’t safely go any higher and I couldn’t afford to actually own or full-time lease my own horse then. How many of the pentathletes are regularly riding a horse with the scope to jump sizeable courses and practicing over fences of 3’ 6" or higher? I bet not many!)
Different problems, mean different solutions are needed. For the Cross Country phase of Three Day Event, perhaps fences which are less tricky to address at speed are needed, as well as qualification changes intended to keep riders from progressing up the levels too quickly before they have developed the experience and judgement to go higher safely. But for Modern Pentathlon, just dropping the maximum fence height to 3 feet and making serious errors such as horse or rider falls an automatic elimination would probably fix the problem. And those are easy changes to make!
Where are you finding these barns that let their schoolies jump 3’6’’? Every barn I’ve been at topped out their school horses at about 2’6’’, or maybe 3’.
I have taken decades of lessons and consider myself to be a competent rider. At no point did I ever have the skill to competently jump a four foot jumper course on my own horse or anyone else’s. I think the height is ridiculous
Where are you finding these barns that let their schoolies jump 3’6’’? Every barn I’ve been at topped out their school horses at about 2’6’’, or maybe 3’.
That was my point. A rider ISN’T going to find school horses jumping 3’ 6", much less the 4’ the Pentathlon riders were jumping. And for obvious reasons - even if they have a horse capable of jumping big (and some do), the lesson barn isn’t going to risk the safety of the horse, whose primary job is teaching beginners and intermediate level riders who aren’t ready to jump that high. I was jumping school horses over 3’ to (rarely) 3’ 3" fences, but that in no way prepared me to jump 4’ and I knew it. To go further, I needed my own horse (either purchased or leased). I bet a lot of these pentathletes, whose primary interest isn’t equestrian and who aren’t normally jumping anything higher than 3’, simply lack the access to the horseflesh they need in order to become competent over sizeable fences - ergo, they shouldn’t be jumping them.
Do we have to wait for a horse or rider to be killed in pentathlon to get concerned about it? Because really, it is pure luck if it hasn’t happened yet, based on the videos I’ve seen from just that one day last week.
Obviously there is some risk to all horse sports, and anything can happen when you get on a horse. But to see that many train wrecks from ONE DAY of competition, out of only 36 competitors, when the athletes are presumably among the best in the world if they are at the Olympics, is really shocking. It’s not as if they just had a rail or two down. Multiple riders were plowing through entire jumps multiple times.
One of the articles said that 1/6 of them did not complete the riding phase. That’s a pretty darn high percentage.
Especially considering how hard it is to get eliminated from that phase, compared to every other horse sport that involves a course of jumps in a ring.
