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Re: [RC] horses: registered vs mustang vs heinz 57 - Lif StrandAt 07:47 PM 9/8/2004, Mary Ann Spencer wrote:20 yrs ago the 'registered Arabians' were too expensive for those of us who were riding and trying to ride endurance. I was riding and buying Arabians for endurance longer than 20 years ago. They weren't too expensive if you looked for the athletes, not show horses. Of course, even then I felt that paying a thousand or two for a good endurance prospect was money well spent - and I've spent more than that on one. For the most part: Arabian show people turned down their noses at those of us who rode endurance and trail. They also snubbed those of us who rode Engish Hunter Seat saying there would never be classes to go anywhere. I gotta tell you that I know lots of show people who during the time you're talking about told me they wished they could do endurance too, but there was no money in it. My business partner at the time (during the 80s) was involved with the show world, so I'd go to shows with her and look at all the show horses with an endurance point of view. I'd wear my Tevis buckle at the Arabian Nationals - before the crash, when there were supposedly all those snobby show people you mention - and would have strangers stop me and talk about how interesting and exciting endurance was. When I wore that buckle I felt like an ambassador for endurance riding. Sounds like Lif is part of that crowd. Um. You got your facts from where? As it happens, I've never shown a horse. Never been in a show or owned a show horse (well, Ben Nasrif started out as a show horse, but I didn't own him then). Have been riding trail, CTR and endurance since the mid-70s, when I was finally able to afford my own horse, which was 3/4 Arab, papered, and who only died last year without ever having once been in a show ring. I've been riding "endurance" style and defending it to both English and Western riders for just about three decades now. If you feel that puts me in the snobby, Arabian show crowd, well, OK. But I think that's pretty weird. She is entitled to her opinion but she is intolerant of those of us with another view I guess the fact that I keep asking people for facts and not opinions counts as intolerance? Until the market crashed very few ARABIAN purebred were ridden endurance. People were paying $10,0000 for fancy show horses but their rejects were sold cheaply to 'endurance' riders usually without papers. I'd like to see the data on the notion that few Arabian purebreds were being ridden endurance before the crash, which I believe would be considered 1986 or so. Sorry, I know I'm wearing blinders to keep asking for the facts. Please forgive me. I do know this: For sure no one I was buying my purebred Arabians from for the years before then was offering them cheaply to me without papers! They all knew I was looking for endurance horses, too. ________________________________
Lif Strand fasterhorses.com
Quemado NM USA
High Country Rider: An endurance rider's journal
www.fasterhorses.com/highcountryrider/
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