Re: [RC] FEI and 100 mile competitions/elevators - Truman Prevatt
Yep you and Angie are are absolutely right about this. If you want to
do a 100, enter a 100. For the rider ninity percent of a 100 is mental.
You need to be primed for it and focused for it without a bailout point
at 75 miles. It's too easy to take your points and go home after the 75
rather than elevate to a 100.
I think the LD to 50 is the best use of the elevator format. If a rider
is fresh and the end of 25 and has plenty of horse then it's a good
introduction to a 50.
Purhaps we need to bring back the elevator concept for those folks
scared of the 100. Alot of people may move up from a 75 to 100 and
enjoy it then want to do more 100's. I am sure this is a legistical
nightmare for ride managers which is why it is not done.
Jennifer
Actually, one reason the elevators became unpopular with managers was
because if offered in such a situation, nearly everyone considering going
the distance would enter the 75, and virtually none of them would elevate.
When you are sitting in camp at 75 miles, knowing you can get credit if
you quit right now, it is VERY difficult to talk yourself into getting
back on the horse and going back out again. But if you put your money
where your mouth is up front, you don't have any choice--if you DON'T get
your butt back in the saddle and go out again, you've got nothing.
Originally we all thought the elevators would work as you suggest--and it
just didn't pan out that way.
Where I think elevators are MUCH needed, though, is on LDs, with the
option to elevate to the 50. Folks who know they are going to do 50
regardless are much more willing to simply enter the 50 to start with, but
I HAVE seen several cases where someone toying with moving up to 50s would
enter the familiar LD and then be willing to go on if the horse was up to
their expectations at the end.
Heidi
-- "It is necessary to be noble, and yet take humility as a basis
"It
is necessary to be noble, and yet
take humility as a basis.
It is necessary
to be exalted, and yet take modesty as a foundation."
