Ann Romney = Animal Abuser

[magical thyme]

76. my experience is that they do love what they are doing

horses don't make it to high levels without loving it. My old gelding missed not being ridden after he became too sound to ride. I have no doubt of it; his behavior -- picking up his bridle and shaking it at me, jealousy if I got on another horse -- told me that. He missed doing the advanced work. The last time I sat on him, just a couple months before his catastrophic accident, he wanted to passage and was just brimming with energy but not enough muscular strength to do what he wanted.

Dressage showing is really just a test of training. Do you think dogs should not be obedience trained? I have no more problem with dog's obedience trials then horse competitions.

I rode Algiers in only 2 shows, but it was too expensive to do more. In his first show under saddle, he just carefully tried to do everything I asked. He was very excited looking around at all the other horses and calling to them. It was at the farm where we boarded, and he always got excited when they had shows after that. I didn't have the time or the money, so I would ride him around the show so he could enjoy watching, but he was drawn like a magnet toward the arena.

It was his second show, years later, that I discovered how into it he was (he was by nature a show off). In dressage, you enter the arena and travel down the center line, then halt and salute the judge (as a sign of respect) and the judge rises from their chair and nods their head as a return salute. After the test, which is a sequence of figures and movements, you again travel the centerline, halt and salute.

Well, at our second show, Algiers confidently trotted down the center line. We halted and I saluted. The judge rose and nodded. And then ducked his nose down to his knees, and lifted his head with ears pricked. The judge looked surprised, as was I. Any thought that it was an accident ended with the test. Our second trip down the centerline, halt, salute, judge salutes, and Algiers again "saluted" by ducking his nose to his knees. The judge was biting back laughter, I was cringing. We rode 2 more tests in that show, and he started and finished each test with his own salute! The judges were laughing by then, but they didn't score us down for it. T

The thing is, with the intended approach -- that dressage competition is really competition with yourself and advice from expert professionals on where you are doing well and where and how you can improve -- it is a good thing. Professionals compete as advertising. Ammys generally compete for fun for themselves and their horses. It's the ones who's egos get in the way, or who are "win at all costs" and lose sight of the intended purpose, who make a mess of it.

On the other hand, there are horses in people's back yards who have never been through the "abuse" or "misuse" of a show, but also have never been fed a decent diet, had their teeth neglected, their hooves neglected, never de-wormed, etc.