Ridecamp: Re: [RC] Green Horses - or is it really green riders?

Sort of like rodeo horses for the timed events--they can't wait to get into
the box or cross the start/finish line for their event.  Makes you wonder if
horses can be adrenaline junkies, doesn't it?

----- Original Message -----
From: "Lif Strand" <lif@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <ridecamp@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Sunday, May 26, 2002 11:25 AM
Subject: [RC] Green Horses - or is it really green riders?


> I've been waiting for someone to point out that in our sport, some of the
> horses that are acting up the worst are not green at all, they're just
> pumped up with adrenaline and no place to put that energy until they get
to
> start.  And why are they "acting out"?
>
> Mike wrote:
> >one mile into the ride, an out-of-control horse dumped its rider on his
> >head causing concussion (and was lost for a few hours wandering the
desert
> >without his horse), and then several miles from the first vet check, yet
> >another "green" horse kicked at another horse but missed, hitting instead
> >the rider, causing compound fractures of her leg and requiring a medievac
> >helicopter ride.
>
> Green horses or excited horses with less than perfectly in control
> riders?  Would either of these horses have acted this way with a more able
> rider?  Do you know for a fact that the *horses* were green - or is this
> really a rider issue?
>
> I think many times - perhaps most - it's the quality of riding that
> determines whether these accidents will happen or not.  I would bet good
> money (if I had any money and if I wasn't so cheap that I'd risk betting
> it) that if you put a Hilda Gurney (just to pick a name out of the helmet)
> on one of those "green" horses they'd suddenly be not very green at all.
>
> Let's face facts - endurance doesn't measure horsemanship in any direct
> way, and I'd put more of that good money on a bet that a *very* high
> percentage of endurance riders have not had any great amount of
> professional riding instruction in their pasts.  So let's forget expecting
> horses to behave properly if the riders don't know how to ask for that
> behavior.
>
> Lif Strand
> Quemado NM  USA
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 Ridecamp is a service of Endurance Net, http://www.endurance.net.
 Information, Policy, Disclaimer: http://www.endurance.net/Ridecamp
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