Re: RC: VC's pet peeve

[tina hicks <tina@liveonthenet.com>]

A penalty like that is common at many larger rides - OD is one of them -
or at least they did the year I went. Didn't seem to create too much of
a nightmare - 99% of the people that went to the vet check area were
down and those that weren't didn't get to pass GO and the line got a
little shorter for the rest of us :).

Riders just made sure their horses were *down* for real and not right at
criteria before going through. People are basically trainable, even
endurance riders,:) - we knew the rules before the ride started and
acted accordingly.

I don't know if that should be the rule on all rides but it didn't seem
to be a big deal at the OD. 

At many of the SE rides, the pulse folks will offer to do courtesy
checks *if* they aren't busy. 

But I do agree with Steve that riders shouldn't rely on a courtesy check
to find out if they are ready to go through. 

I, too, went for many rides where I hadn't mastered finding the HR with
my steth...I just figured if I couldn't find it he was down <g>.

Tina

Susan Willis wrote:
> 
> Steve -
snip..... 
> But to make a blanket
> penalty for any horse that is 'High' creates a nightmare for ride
> management and unfairly penalizes those that DO check their horse, but the
> horse still tends to get excited in line and run 'high'.......
> 
> Susann