The article was not clear whether these are clients he was coaching on their horses, or whether these clients were owners of horses that Kevin was competing for them. Maybe I’m giving too much benefit of the doubt, but I would assume a decent number of the ones that left are in the latter category, and in that situation it seems like they wouldn’t have much choice but to find another rider for their horse(s). So, I’m not sure it is fair to criticize all departures equally, even though it was sad to read about the loss of clients.
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I agree that I won’t skewer clients that decided that they needed to move on. Especially those who he was riding horses for, not just instructing. It absolutely sucks, but it is not like they bailed because he had a broken ankle. No matter how far he comes back with therapy, he’s never going to ride at the same level again, if he ever rides again. it doesn’t sound like he had a assistant trainer that could have easily slid into the role of the main rider. Plus the clients were paying for someone with the resume of a Olympic rider, not just whatever working students he may have had at the time.
This was a reasonable article. While horse people can see some holes in it - the message was clear and did not have glaring errors. In addition, it could have been read by someone with no horse knowledge whatsoever and still been coherent and understandable. The piece written by Sarah Nir last year about the Barisone/Kanarek debacle was truly insulting for anyone who knew anything about horses at all.
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Thank you BAC. He was…we never had a golf cart on the farm because he loved to walk. When he wasn’t able to, I wanted to get him one. He said no- and drove our lawn tractor everywhere. He was a good sport about everything up until his last breath.
What struck me the most is that this is yet another example of how messed up the U.S. healthcare system is. It’s going to take a lot of money and rehab for Kevin to recover, and he and his family are well aware of that and extremely grateful for the financial support. But it really saddens me on another level of the sheer amount of money it’s going to take for his recovery. His insurance, as well as most other riders’, is so disgustingly overpriced and undercovered that he’ll need every penny of the fundraising that’s gone to him for rehab. I’m glad that so much money was raised for him, because he certainly deserves every penny and chance he can get, but this may not have been the same story for another rider who is still up-and-coming.
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This is the latest Facebook update from Kevin’s wife. I believe the posts on her page are public.
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It is rewarding to see so many new contributions to the GoFundMe. Perhaps a result of the article.
