Re: rider genders

[Sue Brown <sbrown@wamedes.com>]

>A client posed a curious question to us the other day...we were discussing
>endurance and Nelson expressed his desires and goals for riding this year
>and the client made a comment to the effect that yeah, but aren't most
>endurance riders women?  I never thought about it!  Any statistics out
>there from ride managers of the men vs. women rider ratios?  Just a curious
>thing...for some reason, I tend to think there ARE more women but that's
>just a feeling and of course, being a woman, I would think that!  Just
>something I was interested in finding out and thought could be an
>interesting discovery for us!

I don't have any statistics on this, but I've had definite observations
over the years having been around other disciplines (dressage, H/J, and 4H
with a boy riding.)  What I've observed is that there is a very small
percentage of males in the lower levels -- more girls starting, I guess --
then, as you get higher in the ranks, the percentage of males gets greater.
 One of the things that I noticed in regards to endurance as a discipline
is that the percentage of guys involved seems to be much higher overall
than any of the others...even (maybe even more so) at the lower levels.
The guys involved with endurance riding are also more "normal, every-day"
type guys...not those with a huge barn and big backers.  In dressage and
H/J, the guys that stick with it to the top are most often revered and
pretty powerful in their influence towards their discipline...and have
people with lots of money providing them with competitive mounts.

I know for sure that I wouldn't have gotten Steve out riding and training
with us (in a pair of skin tight breeches) if there weren't so many other
guys involved with this sport (a lot of them also wearing breeches. ;-))
Up until now (and we're talking married 16 years) he has done very little
riding...very supportive but not interested in the discipline of the moment
<g>...and now I've had him out on 3+ hour training rides twice since the
first of the year...totally different attitude towards this sport!

Sue

sbrown@wamedes.com
Tyee Farm
Marysville, Wa.


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