Re: RC: Horse Dying at Endurance Ride

[Lif Strand <fasterhorses@gilanet.com>]

At 09:41 AM 6/22/01, Corbelletta, Antonio wrote:
>the objective criteria looked good and the horse just died?
>I think that someone messed up big time and I mean not just the idiots that
>were competing.
>
>Maybe all the facts are not in

Exactly.  It does happen that horses that are not over ridden drop dead for 
entirely other reasons.  There does not have to be a direct connection 
between having been ridden - no matter how hard - and the death.  I hate 
jumping to conclusions because I've been proven wrong so many times.  If 
the vets didn't see a problem with this horse and pull it, then maybe 
that's because the horse wasn't showing signs that it was in trouble - 
maybe the horse wasn't in trouble!

I've been on a multi-day trail ride where a horse dropped dead - wasn't 
over ridden and was in what appeared to be perfect health.  Turned out 
there was old worm damage from before the guy owned the horse - blew out an 
artery or something.  The guy was devastated, we were all upset, but it 
wasn't his fault!

My point is what if this horse that died didn't die because of anything 
endurance related?  This is why I was glad when no one talked about it.  We 
just don't know.  We haven't been given an autopsy report, or a vets 
statement or anything.  So how can anyone be judged?

Lif Strand
Quemado NM  USA
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