I just received confirmation from Lauren Moore at USEF that the Fairfax bridle is permitted under the new equipment rules.
I sent her photos of the padding and links to the Fairfax data.
Screenshot of Lauren’s email is below in case anyone needs it for a discussion with a TD.
We just went and confirmed with one of the TDs here (not the one who told us no on Wednesday) and this woman said that it’s fine and always was. I asked the TD on Wednesday three times to confirm it wasn’t legal and her response was “you need to buy a new bridle if you’re going to compete”.
Thankfully for one of our horses we are switching him back to his Fairfax for his championship classes today and tomorrow.
I know that bit makers list whether their bit is USEF/USDF/FEI legal. I think bridle makers are going to have to do the same. How annoying for them.
Fairfax does list that it is FEI legal. However it would be extremely hard for any manufacturer to keep up with each individual organization world wide. As a stockist, I have previously checked in with USDF and they were unwillingly to approve it for us without a sample directly from Fairfax.
For those of you competing and asking TD questions, I would ask the TD’s what is the problem that this was a proposed solution? Was there an epidemic of sore horse ears? Sore polls? Horses with headaches?
By the logic used, any saddle pad with spine relief should be illegal, because it might put additional pressure elsewhere.
…which is the effing point, to take pressure off the SENSITIVE areas and move it
For anyone following along - our horse we switched back to his Fairfax won the Third Level Freestyle this morning so yay for that!
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