Whoa. I am sorry but can you please explain how you came to this conclusion from my original post? Where did I drag her through the mud?? Where did I even say anything remotely negative?? I am seriously beyond confused how you can leap from a legitimate question to me judging amatuers??? WTF. I literally admire this rider and in no way was criticizing her or “concerned” for her.
I only shared the blog so people could read the details and see the video, which I thought were perfect to help analyze and answer my question. A public Blog I presume is public for a reason, anyone can read and find it and it is easy to find. I’m sorry to have offended you by this post but you have my intentions 100 incorrect.
I don’t have an eventing coach to bounce questions off of. I don’t live in Aiken or Ocala and have access to dozens of amazing trainers and riders. Coth has always a place to get great advice and point of view.
I wasn’t going to chime in initially because I don’t feel like I have enough experience to actually respond to the original post. But, for what it’s worth, it looked like a stop to me, and clearly the officials felt that’s all it was. I’m not sure why it would ever be ruled as a horse fall. Horse and rider recovered easily, reapproached and succeeded. It seemed like they were doing pretty well overall from the video, until the RF. (It is hard to judge from a helmet cam.)
What I really wanted to comment on was her blog name! I was expecting a very low-level amateur when I clicked the link. She’s clearly not! She’s not a ‘bad eventer’ at all!
Whatever the intent of your original post was, it clearly did not read that way to a larger audience. Perhaps that is not as you intended, but it came across in very poor spirit. Divine Comedy summed up the issues better than I could, which is why I applauded the post.
Well I am sorry for that, but I think a lot of posters here just make assumptions that I have alterior motives or something, because I ask uncomfortable questions at times. I don’t think my OP was judgemental whatsoever, I literally laid out the scenario in basic details and shared the video for reference. Never once said a damn negative thing. Everyone loves to hate on me but they just cant resist clicking my threads either.
Yahbutt you always post in an alarmist Chicken Little type of tone. And then drone on and on about the safety issues. We all get some of the points, but less is more sometimes. There is no idealist safety in the world societies or in nature, never has been.
By opening up the conversation specifically about her, linking her video and blog, and naming her, you opened up a conversation that specifically critiqued her riding and her decisions. She did not publicly ask for anyone to critique her and yet now internet strangers are judging her decisions and riding, and armchair quarterbacking her. SHE DID NOT ASK FOR THAT. Luckily most on here had the sense to push back against this but even the poster using her blog as background info offered critique on her choices is something that just proves identifying information allowed public judgment. Maybe you don’t consider that dragging her through the mud, but I know that if I, as an amateur, had my mistakes or choices critiqued by the general public in a way that was totally unasked for, in a moment where I already felt fairly demoralized and destroyed, I would for sure feel as if I had been dragged through the mud.
Her latest blog states that she is being ‘crucified on social media’. I don’t think she feels this thread is as harmless as you do.
You’ve edited the OP in such a way that would have been mostly acceptable had you started with that. I still think it would have been even better if you waited more than a day after the show to post the question, so it was more difficult to determine which show, and therefore easier to figure out which rider, was being referenced.
Unfortunately, the damage is done. I wouldn’t be shocked if she decides it’s time to stop sharing with her blog, which was one of the most refreshing, frank, and funny takes on the sport and the difficulties you face when competing that we had.
Maybe next time you should think harder about the way in which you present your posts. Your question was valid. The rest was not okay.
Well I care about people and horses who die in eventing and making our sport safer all around. If you don’t feel the same you don’t have to open my threads. I disagree with your opinion entirely, but you are certinaly entitled to share it here
No one was crucifying her, at all. I see you are happy to crucify me though. With a public presence comes people reading, sharing and discussing your online presence (blog). I was in no way negative, rude or hateful. Can spin the story any way you want in your head so I fit into the picture of me you made in your head.
I seriously hope someone who is talented and accomplished rider isnt thinking for more than 5 seconds about me asking a simple question on an eventing forum trying to educate myself.
Let the thread die, thats the best way to ensure no one is upset, right?
There’s been a history of only picking on certain riders on this BB in the name of safety while favorites get a pass. That’s not an altruistic search for education in the name of safety, that’s a witch hunt.
All it does is limit riders to only talking about the good moments.
A rider who’s open about the rises and falls of eventing doesn’t deserve to have her stop reclassified as a fall, or to have people suggest that she needed to retire at that fence, or be held until a TD can evaluate them.
This thread has driven traffic there. If the blogger doesn’t like it, she can go private.
’Crucifixion’? Really?
I did get from the blog that the blogger was conflicted about how she was pushing this horse along and for the reader, that conflicts with the breezy or minimizing - as some call it - ‘self-deprecating’ tone of the writing.
A mistake at a Prelim table is serious business. Tonally, it’s where breezy induces queasy in the reader.
I’m as relieved as anyone that the blogger and her horse are relatively unscathed but there’s no getting around that it’s a worrisome XC report.
Riding is rarely perfect - even Mike Plumb claims to have been in pursuit of the perfect ride for the last like 70 years - and I do applaud riders who put the honest view out there for all to share. We’ve all been there and we’ll all be there again and we’ll be thankful that there’s a community of fellow travelers to help us through.
Something that seems to be consistently missed is that unfortunately, you can’t tell someone they don’t feel a certain way just because you didn’t mean for them to feel that way. It isn’t possible for someone to be incorrect about the way that they feel. You can think it’s silly that they feel that way, or wish that they didn’t, but the reality is that sometimes our actions have consequences we didn’t intend and in that moment our intentions are entirely irrelevant to the consequences. We only have two choices in that instance: to try to change the outcome, or to decide for whatever reason that we don’t care.
Right now, your response is reading as if you don’t care about the way people feel because of your post (in this case, seemingly because you think they are responding incorrectly). That is well within your rights, of course, but I hope you are making that choice consciously instead of accidentally. Otherwise, you may want to adjust your response.
So then where’s the worrisome critique of all the other riders who had stops?
Or the congrats of when she didn’t have stops?
Why is telling the blogger they can just go Private the only solution? That’s how we lose honest bloggers, the “it’s your fault you put yourself out there.”
Most people on here said it wasnt a fall and she was perfectly within rights to continue. I don’t really see anybody bashing on her at all after the initial post. Which wasnt really harsh but was critical in tone.
In her blog, it sounds like looking back she may not have made the decision to do the event given the prior events. But that’s her blog and area to air her grievances as such.
Not sure what you mean about ‘solutions’. If you don’t want the public reading your blog, you don’t let the public read it.
As for your blogging, if you don’t like the back-and-forth that comes with having a following/readership, then blogging wouldn’t be for you. A diary or journal might be more your thing.
I’ve been a professional writer for 30+ years. If there’s a way to slam someone’s writing work, I’ve experienced it. My soul is very much not crushed and I’m still out there working.
Also, it strikes me as rather hilarious that people who are brave enough to gallop horses at solid obstacles can be so afraid of a few critical words.
Very few people in this world are “required” to blog. As far as I can tell, most people who blog choose to do so because they believe they have something worth sharing via that format, and they want to be influencers in their chosen topic. If you have a public blog, you open yourself up to public criticism. You really can’t have it both ways.
Boy, you should see some of the review comments on my journal papers and legal opinions.
In this case all I see is an honest question with links to the PUBLIC data and then a hypersensitive response ending with a blogger who seems to think that folks are criticizing her?
The question was asked and answered. The rest is a critique of how the question was asked. Lots of good information there. And the Kardashians are still idiots.
