Re: [RC] AERC changing to FEI like rules?? - Richard ALLEN
>>Actually, I think the new rules do point out this particular action (as people use it to instigate a delay in the time from "entering the vet gate" to "presenting to the vet for pulse". i.e. they enter the vet gate, the horse starts to pee, so they must stop for a minute or so, and then they go on to the vet.
jt
I didn't know the action had been specifically addressed in new rules, so hands up. But, in a way, not. Any intra-vet-gate anti-whistling initiative, as I think we must now call it, is surely an _expression_ of a broader principle, which is that once you have presented your horse to the vet it is there for the purpose of veterinary examination intended to determine the extent to which it has or hasn't been compromised by its exertions, with a view to chucking you out of the race if there's anything remotely wrong with your horse. This is a Good Thing.To this end rules are established to prevent riders from clouding the issue.
I can get my horse's pulse to drop a few beats per minute if I rub his forehead, because (at the risk of anthropomorphising) he likes it. But the vet wants to know what his pulse rate is as a result of his labours, and if I rub his forehead I'm clouding the issue. In theory I could get his pulse down from 65 bpm (elimination) to 63 bpm (pass). From my horse's point of view this might not be such a big deal. But what if I can get it to 63 bpm from 70?.... ? I might be doing this because I really like my horse, and I want to do nice things for him; ?I might be doing it to squeeze through the exam. Either way an important veterinary parameter with potentially serious consequences, established in the interests of my horse, is being fudged.?
So there's an FEI rule against, amongst other things, rubbing your horse's forehead during the veterinary exam. Taken alone it sounds ridiculous - but it ain't.
I think what often happens is that broad principles have to be expressed in specific terms, but the specific terms alone look daft, and they are easy to snipe at. Endurance is looked down on by the rest of the equestrian world. In the UK we're referred to as 'old ladies out for a nice hack on fat ponies'; in France it's 'dirty people on thin horses'. So the FEI instigates a dress code - which is not applicable outside the FEI, let's not forget - and next thing you know the FEI is being shot down, once again, this time for 'demanding' collars on shirts. If anyone knows how to get a hard drive fixed for less than the cost of a Mac I could produce hundreds of photos of top-level FEI riders from around the world, at championship events, wearing t-shirts . They're just not, you know, their *favourite* t-shirt. The one with Jimi Hendrix on, or "I'm With This Idiot". They look smart, athletic, sporting, what-have-you, and are thereby adhering to the spirit, if not the letter,of the dress code. Is the dress code such a big deal that the integrity of the entire international endurance structure crumbles? Nah.
As for the whistling business, golly, so they went to all the trouble to establish a rule for the three people in the world who can actually, genuinely, get their horse to pee on command, rather than the millions of us whose horses think they can get us to whistle tunelessly on command just by peeing. Those FEI folks are nuts!
