The Shortest Rolex Update Ever

I'm here, Rolex is amazing, the weather is beautiful, The Good Witch got totally screwed on her beautiful dressage test (awarded a 53.0 for a beautiful, fluid test, placed far behind 'big name' riders with multiple blaring errors in their tests), had a great and strong XC run until the Corners and then took off on a half-stride, hung a front leg, helicoptered over the fence and fell. Both she and Jennifer are OK but they loaded both onto vehicles and transported them away. Mike Winter's Olympic mount Kingpin, 5th horse on course in the AM, looked great coming to fence 9, then came to fence 10 with his head hocked, took the fence, came down with both his back legs on it, somersaulted and fell - died on the scene, possibly in midair. A full necropsy is being performed, but it is speculated that he died from a pulmonary embolism. Preliminary necropsy inspection states that there were no broken bones that had been found, but there was bleeding in the abdomen. Mike Winter went to the hospital but they think he's okay.

I hate to say it, but they really 'dumbed down' the XC course this year - much simpler than I ever remember it. Is that what we need though? Is the four-star level unobtainable to the mortal man? SHOULD it be? Have we done all we can do for safety?Everything I saw looked frangible - nothing like the killer flower basket jump last year that claimed Frodo Baggins. And what CAN you do at the very top level when temperatures are in the 80's and you're galloping and jumping for 11 minutes? Horses can and do suffer major body failure when under the influence of such stress. Horses can and do suffer major body failure standing in their pastures too.

I'll tell you something though. Eventing is under violent fire. Everyone is on about how it's a 'killer sport', slaying horses left and right. Last year, there were an alarming number of horse deaths in eventing, no one can deny it. But did anyone look at racing for instance? How come with the tragic deaths of big names like Barbaro and Eight Belles, nobody pointed fingers at the dangers of racing? Nobody flushed out the crooked likes of trainers, jockeys and owners who run their young horses too hard, too fast, too young? A recent study shows that over 5000 racehorses have died at the track since 2003, most due to catastrophic breakdown. That's over 800 a year, most at seedy backwoodsy tracks - and how many deaths DON'T get reported? Does ANYONE else thing that maybe RACING is a more dangerous sport? Are the big, twisted names there paying off people to keep their mouths shut?

Eventing is a honest sport for 99% of it, and the honest people behind it are looking for honest answers to the big safety questions nobody has asked until now. In the 1936 Olympics for eventing, for example, only fifteen of forty-eight horses competing in that event negotiated the number four water obstacle with no difficulty. Twenty-eight horses fell, and three refused to jump it at all. The obstacle injured three horses so badly they had to be destroyed on the scene while dozens of others lost confidence or at a minimum lost time on the course due to the experience. One rider had to chase his horse for several miles before mounting and continuing on. The water obstacle ended up being incredibly deep in the center, and full of soft mud on the bottom - breaking legs as horses landed.

But nobody pointed fingers back then at safety, just at Berlin and Hitler (rightfully so, of course).

Now, if a horse trips over a tiny dent in the grass, everyone is up in arms about the safety of eventing.

There has got to be a better answer than all this. We've come so far towards making everything safer. I've never seen such a massive, collective uprising of people making a move for a better tomorrow. But why do people thing it's STILL not good enough?

More, and pictures, later.