On Sun, 30 Dec 2007 19:14:34 -0800, you wrote: >Mic, what are your thoughts about this? any comments / input?
After the WC, I put on my official UK Breeding Leader hat and sent a whole bunch of the worst photos of horse abuse from the WC to the head of the FEIF sports committee and to Jens Iversen, President of FEIF. I asked how they felt the photos tied in with FEIF's goals of horse welfare, and what sort of image they portrayed of the Icelandic horse and its training. I never received any reply. I wasn't (and am still not) impressed. However, I think Will Covert DID have some success (as a FEIF International Judge) in getting them to listen - at least the Peruvian spade bit has been banned. All kudos to him, and especially to Sali Peterson who first made a noise to the USIHC about the use of the bit and got Will to go to FEIF with it. There have been some good articles in the last couple of Eidfaxi's (both English and Icelandic) about how we are perceived, how horses are trained etc etc, but there has also been a fair bit of support on the Eidfaxi site for Runa Einarsdottir-Zingsheim (the woman who rode the grey 5 gait horse in pace that was the "star" photo of the Cavallo article), saying it was a bad moment in time etc etc etc. I have to say from a personal point of view, as someone who was there watching, I suspect in Runa's case it probably WAS a bad moment in time - at no time did I see her intentionally abusing her horse, and almost always her riding was gentle, correct and sympathetic. However, that was certainly NOT the case with many other riders at the WC and sadly, elsewhere too. There's also been some discussion about 5-gait being ridden on an oval track - it is VERY hard to ride a 5 gait test well and to get that short, fast side of pace (not to mention risking horrible injury to the horse if it paces fast round the corners). Hard on the horse, and hard on the rider too.... it's noticeable that an awful lot of the nastiest photos from the WC were taken as the riders were taking their horses down into pace in the 5 gait class. There's a lot of pressure, the horses are excited, sometimes even the nicest rider gets carried away. You have literally about 3 strides to get the pace or you don't get a mark.... Walter Feldman Jr writes in the latest Eidfaxi that pace should never be shown on the oval track, and that the pace component of a 5 gait test should be moved onto a straight track where the horse and rider can show pace properly, without risk or undue pressure. I think that's a really good idea. Mic Mic (Michelle) Rushen ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Solva Icelandic Horses and DeMeulenkamp Sweet Itch Rugs: www.solva-icelandics.co.uk ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Si hoc legere scis nimium eruditionis habes"
