The original page is a self proclaimed “Biomechanics Enthusiast”. I cannot take this seriously.
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Case in point. The hold was most likely a result of his extreme stumble, it’s the only chance for the veterinary and official team to get a closer look at the horse. The hold is the only time a veterinarian without association to the rider is able to get their hands on and inspect a horse and deem it fit to compete and allow them to represent to the ground jury.
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That is not true.
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As someone who has spent plenty of time on the veterinary side of the hold box at this event, it is.
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As someone who was there, I can assure you it’s not.
Look, I’m not trying to be argumentative or get myself in trouble. But the jog was not the first time the horse was thoroughly examined by unaffiliated vets.
I would bet the house he was spun out of due diligence, but it wasn’t the “only” time he was gone over.
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All of this. I was fairly on the inside this year too.
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@alyssaequestrian I swear I’m not trying to argue with you, but you had me curious how we could have such different experiences. So I pulled up the vet regulations:
https://inside.fei.org/sites/default/files/2025%20Veterinary%20Regulations%20-%20clean.pdf
Article 1045 explains how any horse can be examined by the official vets or stewards at any time and the protocols for doing so. And that aligns with my own experience over the years.
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https://m.youtube.com/shorts/rPvtsZiw_TI
This is the fall in question. Poster is Millstream Equestrian, for disclosure if you do / don’t want to give clicks.
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People have been posting controversial videos since Facebook existed and no horse sport has been killed. There are multiple forms of horse sport that I have been horrified by that still happily continue despite videos posted on the internet.
I’ve seen just as many posts from people getting super angry at anyone who finds anything wrong with what happened, saying that if you don’t “ride at that level” you can’t talk.
Isn’t it just as bad to try to stifle conversation in cases of possible poor riding or abuse/neglect?
Haven’t we discussed extensively the rider who’s horse had a huge bit and blood all over it’s mouth, the rider that whipped his exhausted horse, the rider that pressed her exhausted horse until it fell, etc?
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It was also posted under milestone something another.
I am starting to just block all the nasty pages that are making money on supposed animal abuse and calling out the people at the top. They manufacture drama and just stir the pot.
If they weren’t fueled by $$$ I might have a different opinion but the goal is $$ not horse welfare.
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I think that anyone committing suicide after internet pressure is horrible and wrong. I also think what the vet did in the video was wrong.
However, what I found disturbing is the number of people who attacked those who bullied this vet into suicide by saying that he did absolutely nothing wrong in the video and they would have done the same thing. INCLUDING vets. And that the videos should have been kept secret.
How do we stop animal abuse, or advocate to have a vet’s license removed, if we aren’t ever allowed to share abuse videos for fear of the abuser committing suicide?
I think it’s possible to say the vet’s suicide was a tragedy while at the same time recognizing that what happened in the video was wrong.
I do think there’s an issue with pretty much everything with horses being labeled as abusive on the internet.
I’m just not sure how to protect horses.
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This video clip isn’t going to kill eventing. Santa Anita, Olympic home of horse sports in '28, has had 23 horse deaths over since 2023 and they are still racing at Santa Anita. The clip of Calvin Brockman didn’t make national news or really anywhere beyond the eventing world. And if someone saw that clip I’d bet their reaction was what a ride!
What is slowly but surely killing eventing are the powers that be that continue to kowtow to the IOC and the FEI. As long as eventing continues to hold on to those two organizations, it will die a slow death. Videos like this won’t impact it one iota.
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And that’s been the defense strategy for eons - we’re smurfs, remember? We don’t get to have opinions about what UL riders do because we don’t know. We need to stay in our lanes and mind our business. /sarcasm
I’ve also seen quite a few “you clearly didn’t see eventing in the 70s/80s/90s and it shows” comments.
I understand that the horse was apparently fine and that’s good news, but there was no way for anyone to be 100% certain that that horse WAS fine in the seconds where he was down and then straight to galloping off again. Horses can run on broken bones fueled by adrenaline.
Many of the comments I’ve seen say that if the rider had just taken a few seconds, maybe looked the horse over (from the saddle, not suggesting a dismount), walked or trotted a few steps before blasting off - showed ANY concern for the horse at all, really - that it would be a non-issue. And I tend to agree.
While I’m sure the rider cares for his horse a great deal, in those moments he seemed to be prioritizing the competition.
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Milestone Equestrian 
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Milestone Eq is such a PITA. I used to associated with her old inner circle and she was a reasonable person and fun. Lots of grit and still obviously loved her horses. Not sure what happened.
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Yes.
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Honestly I didn’t have that much of a problem with him continuing on. Would I have continued on? No but… If I had to change anything I think the vets should have pulled him up and checked and then let him continue on.
I DO think it was kind of a bad look to represent. If there was any question the horse was sound after the first jog I think it would have saved a lot of face just to excuse yourself.
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This.
And to those criticizing the person/page that posted the video on FB, I watched the video without reading the attached opinion and I was shocked that the rider did nothing to attempt to evaluate the horse’s soundness but just kicked on. The laughter from the commentators made it worse.
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The key word here is “moment.”
The moment has been replayed incessantly and it’s easy to say what could have, should have been done with time to think about and discuss the situation.
But in the moment, it’s not that easy.
Anyone who has been on a horse that has experienced something similar knows that in the moment, you’re not entirely sure what is happening. It’s all so fast. The horse is scrambling and next thing you know, it’s galloping again. And if the horse feels totally normal to you, pulling up may not even cross your mind.
Should there be a different protocol? Maybe, but it’s hard to make a protocol for everything that might happen. Everyone with authority to stop the horse did not deem it necessary to do so in the moment and for the continuation of the course. They could have if they saw reason.
Now maybe in retrospect, everyone involved might rewatch the replay and reconsider their decision in the moment. But bottom line, there were multiple points at which this horse’s weekend could have been ended by officials or the horse’s connections and no one found reason to do so. That is more telling to me than what observers who weren’t involved think based on a single video clip.
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Maybe he biffed that moment. But the second moment where he nearly had a repeat at another fence - maybe THAT one he should have slowed up for a second and checked on his horse…
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