They seemed to think it was something new. Judges have been doing this for years.
“It has come to our attention that the equitation division did not begin the moment we started watching it.”
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I’m warming up to armchair quarterback tomorrow. Since my horse’s retirement has excused me from the obligation to ride the course the next day to justify whatever I said about the class, I plan to say whatever I want about the judging, course design, standard of riding, the distracting triangle on the side of those breeches, and whatever else I’m unqualified to opine on, secure in the knowledge that I will not eat humble pie on Monday morning.
Personally, I PREFER to allow everyone to face in and watch the test be executed. If nothing else it’s less awkward for everyone to leave the line, and it allows a rider to circle a horse who gets restless or who needs to stretch legs before going. But I can’t see a solid reason to actually prohibit people from facing out.
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I have not had a chance to look at the rule change proposals yet, but…
Any USEF member can submit a rule change proposal. Sometimes they make perfect sense, and serve a purpose. Other times, not so much.
They’re just proposals at this point. Some will go through, some will not.
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I’m glad I’m not the only one that despises that little triangle on breeches. I look forward to your judgy commentary
Yeah but let’s have an honest moment: that had a marginal impact on the cost to show. NSBA maybe cut out like $150 worth of fees vs. USEF.
When WEC had free stalls the first year in Ocala and did NSBA, THAT was a significant drop in price.
Whats more, even a B show with no division prize money for the AA hunters is $40/class. For an A premier show with $200 prize money per class in an AA division? $50/class. It’s a little perplexing to me. For B shows with no division prize money, I’d expect significantly less than that, but there we are.
If you want to show at a facility like WEC–with top-of-the-line-everything–it’s going to be costly, no matter the level of the show.
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I believe WEC Ohio did the same thing with the free stalls the first year to draw people to give the place a try. I don’t think they’ve had to make the same offer again at either location. Lol.
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I find that tacky too
Yup, they did in Wilmington, too. And nope, not since then! 
I mean to be clear, I think it was a great marketing strategy. While some weekends have their “lulls,” in general, both WECs are packed.
Around the Wilmington area, there are limited other options that have the same quality of footing and show management, and I think that (combined with the fact their indoor facilities are fantastic) is what draws so many barns week after week, especially in winter.
When my guy was showing in the very low stuff and needed to just go get around the ring, I didn’t mind going where the footing was questionable or management was not as great. I saved a ton of money.
But now that we’re showing in higher divisions, options have gotten a lot more limited unless I want to risk a day of poor footing because of bad weather and bad management. It’s either take that risk, stomach a $1k bill from the WEC show office, or stay home.
Which brings me back to fees and Safesport… in areas like the one I describe, that extra fee and parent involvement is so negligible. That’s not to say there aren’t other parts of the country where that extra cost of time and money could be problematic. However where I am (zone 5), for most families faced with the very limited choice of “go to wec or do unrated,” that decision for sure isn’t made because of extra SS and fees…
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That jumper rule proposal about limiting the height of fences in the schooling ring is a massive overstep and beyond asinine, IMO.
If I jump a big vertical to get my horse sharp, that’s my prerogative.
Yet another proposal that’s a solution in search of a problem.
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That was my feeling too, until I crammed my almost-middle-aged thighs into a pair of them at WEC last year. I pulled out my credit card while still wearing them, the nice ladies at Farmhouse tack cut off the tags, and me and my distracting triangles rode off into the sunset together.
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In some cases, facing in or away doesn’t do a whole lot. Like, if I’m going 3rd in the order and I’m pretty positive rider 1 jumped fence 5 instead of following directions to jump fence 6, I’m not going to necessarily follow suit. Same with the stride numbers in a bending line that’s introduced for the test. I think if you are at a point where you are doing a class with a workoff where you are given instructions while in the ring, you should 1) know your jump numbers, and 2) be able to come up with a plan for yourself. I have had fussy horses and have had to deal with waiting. We were usually off the rail somewhere standing.
One test that is available is to have riders demonstrate their own test on the flat. And this can cause a huge advantage if competitors could watch someone else for ideas.
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Well… not necessarily, these days. I was in a 2’6" “medal” class at Thermal one year with several other Ladies of a Certain Age. The test was read out, and we all looked at each other and started trying to figure out where fence #4 (or whatever it was) was.
But yeah, facing away wouldn’t have helped anyone.
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I’m kinda with you on this. It has been a Very Long Time since I rode a work-off but I distinctly remember one of the challenges being to either Follow the Pack or Think for Yourself. Watching rider #1 go and then thinking, Oh… that is not how I interpreted those directions. Then you have that critical decision to either ape #1 or do what you believe the test to be.
No real concern about advantages/disadvantages of being first to test or last. Last is usually already the class leader, and I’m okay with some advantage built into that.
Either way, can’t imagine this is really worthy of a rule change.
I laughed right out loud at this. Well played!
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I won a class that way (saddleseat, not hunters). The first rider in the workout skipped an instructed trot circle, and all the riders after her did it the same way. I went last, made sure to put in the trot circle (could hear a little buzz in the spectators because I did something different), and won the class.
Not sure “needs” is the right term #featheringtheirnest
I don’t know, they seem have morphed into quite the bloated bureaucracy. So many layers of committees and task forces and all the firings and hirings. It must be expensive to maintain that beast. 
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