How A Helmet Saved My Brains.

Happy National Helmet Awareness Day! In order to stress the serious important of the 'every time, every ride' principle, I want to share with you all the story of how a helmet saved my brains. Especially after what happened, I will never get on a horse without a helmet, nor will I ever handle a dangerous or amped up animal without one either. (One of my favorite teachers at school was in the breeding shed and was knocked senseless when a well-meaning but insufferably klutzy stallion mounted the phantom and clocked her in the head with a hoof. Another place I'll always wear one!) Helmets are like seatbelts. Is there really a good and logical reason NOT to wear them? No. Unless you want to die a horrible, bloody painful death, which is pretty much the only perk I see. I would literally not be here today to tell you this story if it hadn't been for my helmet. It for sure saved my life.

I was fortunate as a kid to have ridden at a barn where it was a set in stone rule that you always wore your helmet, no exceptions, no matter what was going on. I distinctly remember riding off property once with a friend, neither of us with proper headgear, and getting SCREAMED at by my trainer when we returned home some hours later. I never did that again, that's for sure! Time went on and I grew up, had and lost two geldings, and found myself with a little crazy mare named Gogo, rehabbing her brain from her time with the woman who screwed her up so royally. She was very, very claustrophobic of contact, and would rear, panic or bolt whenever the reins got just a hair too tight. I got her back from the Crazy Trainer in late June of 2007 as a manic, frightened mess; by August, I felt as though we might probably be okay at a horse trial (we had done one in early July just for experience, and it wasn't a total disaster. Only partly!). The show was in Pennsylvania, about an hour from where I lived in Ohio, and I planned on trailering in the night before to school at the grounds and stable there. It was my parents' anniversary the day before the show, but they still wanted to come with me and spectate, so they drove the four hours down from Michigan, hopped in the rig with Gogo and I, and continued on with me for another hour to the venue. I had never schooled any of my horses the day before the show at the actual grounds before, and actually never have since, mostly because of my own nerves; I normally give them a day of rest and acclimation instead. For some reason, this particular time I decided to do things differently. We arrived, unloaded our hay, shavings, and buckets, and went back for Gogo. I should have known something was up when I went to unload my horse in the same exact manor as I always had when trailering alone - drop butt bar because she refused to move unless I was at her head, go up front, unhook her from the tie, and unload - and not two seconds after dropping the butt bar, she exploded in the trailer, broke her halter, shot backwards, and rolled over off of the ramp practically into my parents' laps. (For the record, this is the perfect example of how NOT to ever unload your horse! I have since learned my lesson and untie FIRST, ALWAYS. And thankfully, she now backs off quietly if you just tug on her tail.) Hmmm, I thought. That was interesting. But then again, ever since Crazy Trainer, my horse had certainly been freakishly quirky, so I went about my business and started tacking up. My parents left the showgrounds to go find the hotel, promising to return and pick me up whenever I called to say I was done for the evening. I finished tacking, mounted, and headed out to the big field where everyone was riding and warming up in preparation for an early start the next day.

Right from the get go, she was just bad. Just... BAD. She was tense, rushing, gnashing at the bit, spooking at everything, and in general being a holy terror. I don't think she hurt herself in any way after she fell out of the trailer, but I do think it seriously stressed her out, and she wasn't letting go of her anxiety for all the oats in the Quaker factory. I had stayed almost exclusively on one 20 meter circle for the first part of the ride, but became increasingly frustrated with her spookiness and decided to trot to the other end of the field and just let her relax. To my left, I caught out of the corner of my eye a big bay putting on his best National Finals Rodeo impression, launching his rider into the stratosphere before galloping back to the stabling, which was conveniently located right next to the warmup field. I could see the sparks starting to fly from Gogo's rapidly short-circuiting brain, and did my best to steer clear of the rest of the bucking, plunging crowd of horses. I was attempting to trot up a small incline towards one of the dressage arenas, but couldn't quite convince her to steer properly and found myself heading perpendicular to the crest of the hill, travelling horizontally on the incline. Not really a good place to be. There was a pile of something scary at the top of the hill on our right, and she spooked at it. And when I say spooked, I mean completely lost her ever-loving mind. The combination of a highly electric, brand new atmosphere, twenty bucking broncs around her, and the memories of the Crazy Trainer fresh at hand all sent her into a panic, and she bolted. Unfortunately, when she took off, she went shooting and flailing sideways, completely losing her balance as the hill fell away from us and she had nowhere to put her feet. The last thing I remember was watching the saddle coming towards me as she fell, and then nothing.

Bits of memories still stick with me from the following hours. Witnesses said that my horse did in fact land directly on my head with her torso, and immediately sprang up, standing splay-legged over me, staring down at my lifeless body. Unlike the other horse who had bucked his rider off and then galloped away to the stabling, she stayed glued to me, not moving a muscle or even taking a bite of grass the entire time I was laying on the ground. Bless her heart, she probably thought she killed me. As people ran to my aid, I had a big seizure, and then stayed unconscious for probably ten or more minutes. The TD had a very difficult situation on her hands; when I came to I reportedly refused treatment, even though I very clearly had a serious head injury. While I'm pretty sure you can call an ambulance for someone who might be hemorrhaging from the brain, you can also get all kinds of sued for kidnapping if she person really is okay and is refusing treatment. It was pretty apparent that I had a major head injury. Still, no ambulance was ever called.

I remember opening my eyes and being on my back, seeing through tunnel vision a few concerned faces floating around me, talking in far away tones that didn't make sense. The next thing I remember was sitting upright in a golf cart, looking around in confusion. I wasn't worried about it, but I had absolutely no idea where I was, or why I was there. I remember them asking me that very question, and responding calmly that I didn't know. Apparently, I asked to go see my horse, and they took me there, where I then gave her a flake of hay, but I have no memory of this. I don't know who took her back and untacked her. I actually have no idea how all my stuff got back in my trailer without anything getting left behind either. I was then shuttled to the show office, where I apparently asked again if I could go see my horse and give her hay. They told me repeatedly that she was okay and that I had already given her some hay, but I must have asked that question ten times or more. They asked me where my parents were, and not remembering that they were in fact only a few miles away, I told them that my parents were in Michigan, but couldn't remember their phone numbers. Someone in the office put two and two together, and found the horse trailer with the Michigan plates, digging around in my tackroom until they found my phone. They called "Mom cell" or whatever it was that they got to first, and managed to locate them. I guess once my parents arrived I went to see Gogo again and asked my neighbors to feed her for me, but don't remember any of his. I do remember being in the car going to the hospital, being in a room with South Park on TV, and being wheeled down in a rolling bed to get a CAT scan. My poor parents spent their wedding anniversary with their damaged kid in a hospital room until all hours of the night, begging the nurses to let them have some sort of icky hospital food for dinner since they had had nothing to eat all day. That is so crappy! But think of this, at least they didn't spent their wedding anniversary identifying my bloody, lifeless body in a field at a horseshow. That's what would have happened if I hadn't been wearing my helmet.

The next two weeks are pretty much nonexistent in my memory. Bits and pieces float around, but for the most parts, those are two weeks I'll never really get back. I have no idea how we got my horse home, how I took care of myself (thank you roommates), or how I managed to do anything at all in all honesty. Luckily, while I did have a major concussion, I had no lasting damage beyond my already-ingrained quirkiness which I now have an excuse for. The helmet was structurally intact on the outside, but clearly had served its purpose, so IRH graciously sent me a new one free of charge. I still have and wear that helmet today even though it never quite suited me as perfectly at my original IRH. I would never even think about going without a helmet while riding, even if I was sitting on my horse bareback for a minute and a half. You just never know. Look at Courtney King. And Gogo might have come a million lightyears from the mental trainwreck she was on the day of the accident, but she's still that quirky little nutjob somewhere deep inside. Why would I ever take a chance?


My helmet saved my life and brains. What's your excuse for not protecting yours?

Modern Eventing - For Daun

Well I always said I'd do it, and due to the huge number of responses on my last little snarky blurb I thought I'd really get my facts straight and make a real post about modern eventing, and the dangers behind it.

And also Daun... what's malware, and what is this about it? I've never heard of it and even when signed out it's not flagging anything on my computer. So... I dunno! What exactly are you seeing?

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Everyone knows the basics of the origins of eventing. The military man and his cavalry horse were once valued and crucial members of a country's war machine. A military charger needed to show elegance, precision and obedience on the parade ground as well at out executing maneuvers in the field (dressage); he needed courage and great stamina while headed to battle, often needing to cross lengthy and difficult terrain and any number of obstacles to get there (cross-country); he needed to be responsive and fit once he arrived at the battle, still able to perform accurately and swiftly when needed at the end of a long and exhausting journey (stadium). The military routinely tested their officers and mounts in order to ensure their fitness and ability, and it was from this that the sport of "Militaire" was born. It was the complete test for the officer and his mount, and at its first Olympics, only active-duty officers on cavalry chargers were allowed to compete. In Paris at the 1924 Olympics, the "long format" as we know it now was essentially born, and it was open to civilians as well - dressage on the first day, endurance on the second day (which included Phase A, Roads and Tracks, which was followed by Phase B, Steeplechase, and Phase C, a longer Roads and Tracks; a compulsory halt for veterinary inspection followed these three phases, after which Phase D, cross country, began, The compulsory halt later morphed into a compulsory 10-minute vetbox), and stadium jumping on the third and final day. The English effectively coined the term "Three-Day Eventing," and the name stuck.

Eventing has never, EVER been without deaths and major injuries, both equine and human. As I said before, at the Berlin Olympics in 1936, only fifteen of forty-eight horses competing in the eventing made it through the water obstacle without harm. Twenty-eight horses fell, and three completely refused it. The obstacle injured three horses so badly they had to be destroyed on the scene. The water obstacle ended up being incredibly deep in the center, and full of soft mud on the bottom. In the 'olden days,' it was not uncommon for a horse to finish an event in a state of near-collapse - it was rather impressive if the horse finished at all. One of the horses at the Berlin games that was on the US team was badly injured in the shoulder at the water jump, but the rider remounted and continued on anyway. One of the members from the German team broke his collarbone when he fell off in the steeplechase, but remounted - and the next day, he AND his horse fell in the showjumping, the horse LANDING on the guy, but they both got up and went on to win gold for Germany. Incredible to think about. Here's a wild picture from the 1952 Olympics:



The beginnings of a rotational fall caught on film. 68 horses fell on this particular cross-country course at the Melbourne Olympics, and 20 other riders were tossed. At the 1960 Games, two horses were killed in competition. At the 1968 Games, two more died, collapsing on course due to extreme heat and the stress of competition. (As a side note, look at the high-tech cooling devices used in Beijing - pretty sweet.) How many other deaths can we count in these earlier courses? Dozens, and many rider deaths too. Eventing is, and always has been, an extreme and very dangerous sport.

But what of modern eventing? In 2004 and 2005, a new format was introduced for eventing - the modified or "short" format, which eliminated all of the stamina and endurance sections of cross-country (Phases A-C). I was fortunate enough to see the very last Rolex that was run in the long format in 2005 (my first Rolex ever), and I remember feeling teary-eyed while watching those horses gallop their hearts out on steeplechase. It was amazing. They were simultaneously running a short-format course, to "prepare the Olympic riders and horses" because Athens was running the short format, but nobody paid attention or cared - didn't count in our books. And then, the gavel fell - all around the world, the long format was dying. Why did this happen? Massive pressure from the FEI? Venues not having enough time and space to run the long format? Breeders (the Germans and their German event horses, said my German instructor at the time!!) wanting to push the heavier, warmblood types on eventing? Any way you look at it, it was politics. The Olympic committee was threatening to pull eventing from the Games, and the FEI made a swift change. The classic three-day, as we now call it, is enjoying a bit of a renaissance here in the States at the moment, but it wasn't that way at first. Riders and spectators from all over clamored for the return of the long format for many reasons. A lot of people, myself included, believe it is the "true test of horse and rider", and that it teaches horsemanship - the preparation, the hours put in, the blood and sweat and tears needed to condition the horse and human and the care required after takes years to prepare for. The short format, unfortunately, is the springboard for what this post is really all about - what's changing in modern eventing, and why it's just not helping these dangers.


Like I've been saying all along, eventing has ALWAYS been dangerous. So you'd think this short format helps to eliminate some of those serious dangers, yes? Wrong. The idea that the short format saves wear-and-tear on horses is a load of crock. Several recent studies comparing injuries between the long and short format disprove this in an instant. Horses also tend to be far more stressed in the short format due to the shorter warmups, as opposed to the slow, long, methodical warmup leading to Phase D. While it's true that many upper-level riders, especially the old school ones, still prepare and condition their horses in the same way that they used to, it becomes difficult for a horse THAT fit to perform without the miles of Roads and Tracks and Steeplechase to take that bit of edge off. So what do we do? Condition the horse less? It certainly isn't a good idea. Horses coming off cross-country exhausted can and do collapse - one dying already this year, at BEGINNER NOVICE after cross-country. Problem Number One with modern eventing: conditioning, or lack thereof. As riders, are we NOT physically preparing ourselves and our horses for these difficult tasks ahead? Without the push for the long format, the emphases on conditioning becomes way less important, and exhausted horses on cross-country make mistakes. Fatal mistakes. And so do riders. Not to mention that a physically beat horse that DOES make it through cross-country will not perform well in stadium, and may come away with muscle, tendon, ligament, or bone injuries. The emphasis on horsemanship has seen a rebirth in the Training Three-Day, but there'll another post about that later.

In the old days, Phase D was simple - big, gallopy obstacles and a really rhythmic pace. Not so anymore. My personal opinion, shared with many others, is that the Olympic committee, along with the FEI, decided that eventing was not only long and tedious, it wasn't interesting enough now that it was shorter. Solution? Add more questions on course. A lot more. Killer, impossible, wicked questions that sometimes can completely confuse horses. Problem Number Two with modern eventing: changes in the cross-country course to make it 'more exciting.' It was exciting enough, thank you. Now, riders are having to come down out of their rhythmic gallops to these very slow coffin-canters and negotiating obstacles that, let's face it, you're NEVER going to find while galloping off to battle! Jimmy Wofford always talks about jumping out of your gallop rhythm and not needed a rebalancing zone before every fence because you're always balanced, but this no longer applies to modern eventing. You HAVE to slow down before a combination. These seriously complicated questions can and do confuse horses. And all that slowing down, speeding up, slowing down, speeding up, REALLY takes it out of a horse.

Problem Number Three, speculation: is too much emphasis on dressage now, with the conditioning fading? This is not my personal opinion, but I've heard it voiced before. The dressage phase of eventing is becoming violently competitive, especially at the lower levels - why do you think I do so much dressage?? - and at the upper levels, questions are being asked that have never been included before, such as half-passes, flying changes, serpentines, shoulder-ins, counter-canter, and degrees of collection previously unheard of in the upper-level event horse. If you don't score like Bettina did this weekend (a 28.8), you're not going to be competitive. You can't make it up anymore if you get a 50 and your horse jumps around fabulously... those days are long gone. The argument is that this new emphasis on dressage is taking away a horse's ability to think for itself. Which is a load of bull, but I can see how people might think that. If a horse is waiting for you to tell it what to do because it's so obedient, it might not be able to get itself out of a scrap. But I can tell you one thing, you won't see ME riding a horse like that x-country.

Problem Number Four, speculation: there is not enough GOOD riding anymore. Without good horsemanship and conditioning, without excellent position and equitation, a rider is bound to hinder her horse, and sometimes a huge rider error can result in a horse being unable to get itself out of a situation that a rider put it in. I've seen it happen before... I know I make mistakes, and I'm very thankful my horse can get herself out of them.

Problem Number Five, speculation: there is TOO MUCH good riding. If a horse on x-country is ridden perfectly every time, what happens when it makes a mistake and the rider CAN'T help it out? The horse won't know how to get itself out of a bad situation unless it learns how to make mistakes and recover from it. Again, speculation, but I've heard this spin too.

This is just the tip of the iceberg. Feel free to add on.


So what's being done? What can be done? What should be done? What shouldn't? I'm afraid I'll have to put this in another post, because this is getting freakishly long and I'm freakishly tired.




By the way, here's a PETA-type website about the dangers of eventing - a little over the top, but there's some hard data behind it and some very strong opinions that go with that.



Another by the way, about the whole 'no horse has ever dropped dead during dressage' thing? A horse did do exactly that at the Maui Jim CIC** in 2007, from a pulmonary hemorrhage. Really tragic, and it unfortunately just goes to show that death happens everywhere. A horse died this year after XC at Beginner Novice too. Horses die at combined driving events, while rounding up cattle, trailriding, hopping over small fences, giving birth. I knew of a horse that, while his owner was dismounting after a light hack, seized up and bled out through every hole in his head, dead before he even hit the ground. Horses die, and I hate it.



King Pin, by the way, died of a rare condition that involved massive hemorrhaging of the major vessels in his abdomen - unrelated to jumping or running or trauma. Godspeed...



EDIT: By the way AGAIN, I thought I should metion that there are 115 people competing in Open Novice at King Oak. 115. That's a good five or six while divisions of Open Novice - Novice A through freaking Novice E or F. That's insane. And we still haven't been able to go XC schooling.... heart palpitations.

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.