Modern Pentathalon

[Impractical_Horsewoman]

I run and ride, and FWIW, I think it’s a terrible attitude for a runner to have, too!

I’m not sure it’s the same person, but I do remember reading an article about a woman who had trained through hip pain for a half-marathon. It turned out she had a stress fracture in her femoral neck, which snapped during the race, which she completed. However, had she rehabbed the more minor injury (stress fracture) and had it looked at, she would probably have been able to have avoided hip surgery.

I like the idea as well of having to pass a basic riding test, and to avoid the need for loaned horses, perhaps making the test before competition, on a horse of the athlete’s selection, and an instructor would have to sign off on it. Kind of like how long ago with figure skating, there was a school figure portion which was kind of dull (no spectators), but set a bar for minimal skills.

[MHM]

@Impractical_Horsewoman

I’m not sure it’s the same person, but I do remember reading an article about a woman who had trained through hip pain for a half-marathon.

I seem to recall that the article I remembered was about a man, but it was a long time ago, so I won’t swear to it. I think it was his thigh bone that broke, and maybe he did not even realize it was the bone. Maybe he thought it was just a gigantic muscle spasm.

[Equkelly]

@Impractical_Horsewoman

I run and ride, and FWIW, I think it’s a terrible attitude for a runner to have, too!

So true. When I was in high school I ran through so many injuries and I’m still paying for it and I’m in my late 20’s. Even a few months ago I sprained my ankle really badly and I had to actively convince myself not to be stupid about skimping on the recovery time. Sort of related but that’s why I had SO much respect for Simone Biles for pulling out.

[AltersAreUs]

A lot of sports have the “push through the pain” mentality and it just outright breaks a lot of people. But they’re choosing for themselves. The horses don’t get to choose.

[Angela_Freda]

Professionals or their owners, or who?
@JER, can you enlighten who schools the horses before the competition?

[MHM]

For sure.

It’s just quite recently in the big picture that we have started to get away from the mentality of always getting back on the horse, no matter what. Which is a perfectly fine idea if you are not injured in any way. But not such a good idea otherwise. Looking back, there are certainly times when I got back on the horse when I should not have.

And I remember at least one visit to the emergency room afterwards when the doctor could not believe I had gotten back on the horse. Or driven myself to the hospital, for that matter. I guess he was not that familiar with horse people. Lol.

[Impractical_Horsewoman]

Yes, ultimately with any sport, all the athletes (human and animal) should be able to walk away and train another day (with appropriate recovery), not sacrifice their health for the sake of a single competition (or even a single competitive season).

[JER]

Professionals or their owners, or who?
@JER, can you enlighten who schools the horses before the competition?

It depends. Sometimes it’s the owners (almost always for domestic or smaller competitions), sometimes it’s riders/working students affiliated with the trainer or facility that provides the horses.

If you’re one of the 275k people who’ve seen my video from the World Cup Final in Hungary where the horse falls and the girl gets back on - there’s always a big groups of horse care and riders - working student types - who are there caring for the horses. I’ve taken photos in the stabling at various comps over the years (Hungary has awesome pent comps) and it’s abundantly clear that these horses are well cared for and much loved.

I don’t know what the situation was in Tokyo. Japan doesn’t really have much of a riding culture although there are riding schools that usually own the horses. I imagine - as in Beijing - they employed riders from somewhere else (Australia? NZ like in Beijing?) and they worked with the horses over a period of time. But I’m just guessing because I don’t know, I’m just going by what’s been done before.

[TwilightJumper]

I don’t know about anyone else but if all of this including the actions by the german rider had happened in any disciplines I had showed in I would be a thousand percent more critical. I would be having my own meltdown of sorts.

I hope uipm follows through on what they’ve started.

If those photos and videos of Saint boy are recent then the one they posted on Facebook… Are we believing they were taken at the same time?

[JER]

Something else to consider: the almighty dollar.

Referring back to the Ledingham piece, when Tal Coyle’s horse said ‘No mas’, Ireland saw a lot more slipping away than just an Olympic medal.

Sport funding is almost always tied to results and if you want to renew your funding for the next quad (Olympic cycle) you need to get the required results. Often this is spelled out in the funding deal.

If you don’t hit your results targets, you will probably get reduced and possibly lose your funding altogether.

A lot of money might be involved. For example, Pentathlon GB got about $7 million for the last quad despite not getting medals in Rio. It was a surprise that they didn’t get reduced, especially considering that other sports had best-ever results or even unexpected medals yet lost all of their funding.

BTW, $7 million is about $7 million more than most countries get for pentathlon funding. This time out, Team GB took gold in both men’s and women’s so their funding future is looking bright.

An important point about funding is that with funding, you can build an organization and hire support staff like sport psychologist, physiotherapists, nutritionists, specialist coaches, admin people, etc. If your funding gets reduced, people might lost their jobs. That’s a horrible situation to be in.

So medals mean more than just medals. Medals mean money. Money helps ensure success. And so on.

Until a few weeks before Tokyo, Ireland had two very strong medal hopes for pentathlon: Tal Coyle and her fiancé Arthur Lanigan-O’Keeffe. However, in May or June, ALOK abruptly retired citing an injury and chronic fatigue. That left one medal hope.

Pentathlon Ireland is a very small organization that is producing some very good pentathletes (all from riding backgrounds) through the tireless work of a series of directors and coaches. They got some funding for the last quad (they got nothing after London, despite good results) and Tal and Arthur got top-level funding for the Tokyo quad.

So you can see the tension. Pentathlon Ireland has done everything right and then it all goes wrong out of their control.

Meanwhile, Team GB will be angling for even more money following their success, which in turn makes it that much harder for the many minimally- or self-funded athletes who compete against them. Team GB has millions and you’re cobbling together favors and borrowed equipment.

[BWP]

As a Member of The Pony Club, I stand for the best in sportsmanship as well as in horsemanship. I shall compete for the enjoyment of the game well played and take winning or losing in my stride, remembering that without good manners and good temper, sport loses its cause for being. I shall endeavour to treat my horse with consideration.

If we can expect this from 7 year olds…

@JER, we’re very lucky in the UK to have Jabeena Maslin as a SJ coach for our MP athletes. Do other countries have dedicated coaches for this phase, or is it more down to the athletes’ individual coaches? Is there a certification process to prove competency elsewhere? Thank you

[Virginia_Horse_Mom]

@Manni01

How do you know she would treat my horse like shit?

Now you are just sea lioning. It took me a while to see it, but there it is.

[Djones]

As I suspected, this is some cutesy game you are playing on your phone before you trundle off to bed in Germany. Good night @Manni01 . Everyone, she’s playing all of us for her own odd amusement.

[JER]

@Manni01

Just a tiny question for JER because I am too lazy to look up the rules and I am not sure where to look

Yes. A gag is legal.

So are hackamores, which is not a good idea. At a comp in LA, there were several horses in mechanical hackamores (the owner rode them like this) but if a rider has never ridden in one of those and doesn’t understand its action, it can get very ugly very fast.

Following that, I wrote a rule change proposal that a horse had to have a bit and not a hackamore or bitless bridle. It was rejected.

[JER]

@JER, we’re very lucky in the UK to have Jabeena Maslin as a SJ coach for our MP athletes. Do other countries have dedicated coaches for this phase, or is it more down to the athletes’ individual coaches? Is there a certification process to prove competency elsewhere?

Team GB has millions of pounds at its disposal and national training center.

A few other countries have a similar system, like the French at INSEP. The Germans are at different clubs and train with people near those clubs.

In larger territories or unfunded countries, people train with coaches close to home (as a general rule). In the US or Canada, you train with a local coach and pay your way.

Certification is by the national federations. Some have stringent qualification procedures and some have none whatsoever. Some federations outright lie about their athletes’ riding ability. This is definitely a problem.

However, the UIPM (one official in particular has been heroic in this) has cracked down on the perennial riding incompetents. Some Japanese riders had their licenses suspended a few years ago (and they haven’t improved) and now competitions can require video proof of riding ability. But they really need to do this more often.

[Virginia_Horse_Mom]

It’s kind of crazy to me that they outright lie about riding ability, then get on horses at competitions, and try to go round courses between 0.9m and 1.2m high… do the people who lie not comprehend the possibility of serious injury that exists for the riders who are doing this?

Is the UIPM totally unconcerned about the potential for serious injury?

There was one woman at Tokyo… I forget which nationality… maybe Brazil? She crashed a bay horse into an oxer, falling off in the process, then they put her back on and reset the jump (didn’t appear like anyone checked the horse for injury), and she did then manage to get over the oxer, but fell off again immediately afterwards, and was borderline trampled on by the horse in the process. I recently saw a video clip just of that portion of her ride… two falls back to back like that… so scary and dangerous.

[Virginia_Horse_Mom]

Alright - found the TikTok video of the specific rider I’m talking about. Really scary to see the back to back falls…

user8051370106952 on TikTok

[Equkelly]

@Virginia_Horse_Mom

It’s kind of crazy to me that they outright lie about riding ability, then get on horses at competitions, and try to go round courses between 0.9m and 1.2m high… do the people who lie not comprehend the possibility of serious injury that exists for the riders who are doing this?

If you’ve ever worked at a dude ranch or any public trail riding place… you would not be shocked. People lie about their riding abilities more often than not. I’ve straight up confronted people about it too and they said they thought if they lied they’d get a more “spirited” horse. People are dumb and also the general public is so ignorant about what it actually means to be an “experienced” rider or “intermediate” or “advanced”.

I swear people think “learning to ride” is like taking ball room dance lessons where they do it a few times and then get to say it’s something they learned how to do and that’s that. Even when I tell my non horse friends I’m going to lesson next weekend they’re like “but don’t you know how to ride yet?!?”

I just could see how if you’re not getting any guidance from anyone in modern pentathlon, I could totally see how these athletes think they’re more experienced than they are.

[Event_Horse]

@Virginia_Horse_Mom

There was one woman at Tokyo… I forget which nationality… maybe Brazil? She crashed a bay horse into an oxer, falling off in the process, then they put her back on and reset the jump (didn’t appear like anyone checked the horse for injury), and she did then manage to get over the oxer, but fell off again immediately afterwards, and was borderline trampled on by the horse in the process. I recently saw a video clip just of that portion of her ride… two falls back to back like that… so scary and dangerous.

Yes, it was the rider from Brazil. She was the first rider on course. She kept getting ahead of the horse jumping. It looked to me like she could have been really seriously injured on that second fall - internal injuries because although I don’t think the horse stepped on her, his legs hit her midsection pretty hard. I know someone who fell off barrel racing (their metal cinch ring broke!) and their big western belt buckle hit their abdomen in just the wrong way that it ruptured their spleen.

Of course, the horse could have had some pretty significant injuries on the first fall as he went to his knees as he crashed through the fence. No one examined him at all before the rider remounted.

[Mander]

@Equkelly

People are dumb and also the general public is so ignorant about what it actually means to be an “experienced” rider or “intermediate” or “advanced”.

I swear people think “learning to ride” is like taking ball room dance lessons where they do it a few times and then get to say it’s something they learned how to do and that’s that. Even when I tell my non horse friends I’m going to lesson next weekend they’re like “but don’t you know how to ride yet?!?”

Oh boy isn’t this true.

When I worked at a dude ranch and was going through the waiver forms for the week (which asked people what their horse experience level was) any “Expert” or “Advanced” earned an automatic “this person is a beginner” from me. People who actually had experience would always write something “Intermediate” or just flat out put something like “competed training level eventing” or “have been barrel racing for 20 years” etc and let us decide what types of horses they’ll do well on. Talking to the “experts” you’d quickly find out they considered themselves that because they cantered 3 strides on our calmest horse when they came to the ranch last year.

Although surely by now these riders know better than to think cantering once makes them an expert, I expect their train of thought is something like “oh, well I’ve jumped a 3’9’’ fence ONCE at the end of a gymnastic on a lesson horse I’ve been riding for months and I managed to stay on, so surely I can jump a whole course at 4ft. It’s only 3 inches higher. How hard can that be?”